“Point of no return”
“Somewhere Over the Rainbow” is playing in the conference hall in Nayarit following the chair’s declaration that this conference has been “the point of no return” in the humanitarian initiative to achieve a world without nuclear weapons.
Without getting overly specific, he called for an appropriate process in an appropriate forum that would have the goal of a legally binding instrument that would outlaw nuclear weapons by the 70th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The ICAN campaigners erupted into applause at the conclusion of his statement. This is exactly what we wanted coming into Mexico, and we can now leave knowing that the road to Austria has been clearly marked.
More details in a more sober mood later. Now off the the ICAN party!!
Friends don’t let friends…
Alan Robock at the podium in Nayarit, describes climate impact of a nuclear war.
The head of the Civilian Protection division of Mexico’s Ministry of the Interior destroyed Mexico City after lunch yesterday. Which is to say, he conducted a classic IPPNW “bombing run,” showing the overwhelming casualties, physical destruction, and radiation effects of a nuclear detonation over this country’s capital. And if anyone didn’t draw this conclusion for themselves, he confirmed that neither his agency nor anyone else would have the resources to help the surviving victims of such a catastrophe. Read more…
Wasting no time in Nayarit
Setsuko Thurlow offers Hibakusha testimony
The Second International Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons opened in Nayarit, Mexico this morning, and the initial speakers wasted no time in expressing their conviction that an understanding of what nuclear weapons can do requires that we ban and eliminate them.
If there was any lingering doubt that Mexico convened this conference as a springboard to action, that doubt was removed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dr. José Antonio Meade Kuribreña, who said the abolition of nuclear weapons should have happened yesterday. Read more…
The ban is coming, despite the boycott
Bengal tiger at the entrance to the conference hall…keeping an eye out in case one of the P5 tries to crash the party?
As delegations from 146 States began to arrive at the venue for the Second International Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons, more than 100 civil society activists organized by ICAN completed a two-day campaigners meeting to ensure that we will have an impact of our own on what transpires here in Nayarit on Thursday and Friday. Read more…
ICAN arrives in Nayarit
Sunset over Nayarit
The Pacific Ocean laps up onto the beach behind our hotels; large, brightly colored parrots squawk “hola” from the trees; there’s a pair of Bengal tigers with a cub at the bottom of the steps from my room; and right around the corner is a spacious conference room with banners outside for the Second International Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons. The man who shuttles me to my room is curious to know what this is all about, and in no time at all he gets it that something very different from the usual business or government conference is about to happen in Nayarit. He expresses real pride that Mexico would host a large group of countries that want to eliminate nuclear weapons from the world. Read more…
“Human beings have to stop keeping nuclear arms”
NHK-TV in Japan aired a profile of Dr. Masao Tomonaga, IPPNW’s Regional Vice President for North Asia and Director of the Japanese Red Cross Hospital in Nagasaki. Dr. Tomonaga will join the Japanese delegation to the Second International Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons in Nayarit, Mexico on February 13 and 14. He will speak about the long term health effects of nuclear weapons during a session that will also include Co-President Ira Helfand, who will present the findings from IPPNW’s updated Nuclear Famine report.
“Now that the inhumane nature of nuclear weapons has been clarified,” Dr. Tomonaga says during the profile, “we should move ahead and abolish them.”
The P5 are on the run…but toward or away from Nayarit?
Thanks to our friend John Burroughs at the Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy for tipping us off to the latest piece of evidence that the humanitarian framework for nuclear disarmament is causing indigestion and sleepless nights for the P5, its allies, and its think tanks.
A new “consensus statement” from the conservative Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) warns the nuclear-armed states that this new focus on humanitarian impact—in other words, what nuclear weapons actually do when used, regardless of who uses them—is “encouraging opposition to…nuclear deterrence.”
The CSIS is right about that. Read more…
All civilized states to Mexico in February
In March 2013, representatives from 128 countries met in Oslo, Norway for the first intergovernmental conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons. It was, however remarkable that all the nuclear-weapon states were absent and gave incredibly bad excuses for not attending. They were sorely missed. The conference was a huge success and made it absolutely clear—what has always been the message of IPPNW—that no state, under any circumstance, will ever be able to protect and help its own citizens in case of an attack with nuclear weapons. Read more…
IPPNW and PSR mourn an exceptional leader
Dr. Jeff Patterson, a former International Councilor of IPPNW and former president of Physicians for Social Responsibility, IPPNW’s US affiliate, died unexpectedly of a massive heart attack on January 24 in New York City as he embarked on an international trip. IPPNW members from around the world have been expressing their shock, sadness, and grief at the loss of a good friend and tireless peace worker and humanitarian. The following remembrance was published yesterday by PSR.
Dr. Jeff Patterson
Jeff Patterson, DO, was an indefatigable champion who served Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) and will be sorely missed by all who knew and worked with him. Jeff exuded compassion. He cared for human life and committed himself to the relief of suffering; it motivated all his work. Jeff was a gentle soul with a powerful spirit and always provided a calming influence in difficult times. Read more…
IPPNW joins the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health, the World Medical Association, Physicians for Human Rights, and other major medical associations in calling for revocation of a provision of a new Turkish law that would compromise access to emergency medical care in Turkey and make it a crime for independent medical practitioners to provide emergency care in certain situations. Article 46 of the health law drafted by the Turkish Grand National Assembly and signed by Abdullah Gül, president of the Turkish Republic, appears to be targeted at political protesters, imposing fines and up to three years of imprisonment on private practitioners who offer emergency care after the arrival of a state ambulance.
As Special Rapporteur Anand Grover pointed out in a report to the UN General Assembly on the right to health in conflict situations, physicians and other medical practitioners have a right and a duty to provide care to those in need under the International Code of Medical Ethics.
According to Otmar Kloiber, Secretary General of the WMA, “in times of urgency, from earthquakes to floods to protests and demonstrations, the international standards for emergency medical care are based on the medical need of the wounded and sick rather than the presence of official medical transport.”
IPPNW calls upon the Turkish Parliament to remove Article 46 from the health law, to guarantee the right of the Turkish people to emergency care, to respect medical ethics, and to ensure that all medical practitioners are free to provide emergency care on the basis of need without fear of prosecution, fines, jail time, or other reprisals.
Bimal Khadka
Bjorn Hilt
Charles K. Johnson
Gunnar Westberg
IPPNW
John Loretz
Lawrence Wittner
Maria Valenti
mollymcgint
Sue Wareham
Tilman Ruff
Tim Wright
Xanthe Hall
IPPNW peace and health blog 