Former World Leaders Urge Ratification of Nuclear Arms Ban Treaty

[TomVilmer]

Fifty-six former prime ministers, presidents, foreign ministers and defense ministers from 20 NATO countries, plus Japan and South Korea, released an open letter imploring their current leaders to join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

Two of the signers are former secretaries-general of NATO: Javier Solana of Spain and Willy Claes of Belgium. Ban Ki-moon, the former secretary-general of the United Nations also signed.

The signers included former prime ministers of Canada, Japan, Italy and Poland; former presidents of Albania, Poland and Slovenia; more than two dozen former foreign ministers; and more than a dozen former defense ministers.

Their letter amounts to one of the highest-profile endorsements of the treaty since it was completed more than three years ago and was opened to member states of the United Nations for signing and ratification.

“All responsible leaders must act now to ensure that the horrors of 1945 are never repeated,” the letter urged, referring to the atomic bombs dropped on Japan by the United States, the only wartime use of nuclear weapons. “Sooner or later, our luck will run out — unless we act. The nuclear weapon ban treaty provides the foundation for a more secure world, free from this ultimate menace.”

The letter asserted that the risks of nuclear-weapons use have escalated in recent years “whether by accident, miscalculation or design“. The pact negotiated in 2017 is now just six ratifications shy of the 50 needed to take effect.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/20/world/treaty-nuclear-arms-united-nations.html

https://www.icanw.org/the_treaty



129 countries has joined this process, but not yet the United States...