WORLD COURT PROJECT PAVES THE ROAD TO SOCIAL SANITY
U.N. Non-Governmental Organizations Call for Abolition By 2000
The U.S. administration is vigorously patting itself on the
back for its Non-Proliferation Treaty victory. But, NPT
notwithstanding, in a one month period last summer the United
States added three nuclear weapons submarines to what is already,
by far, the world's largest nuclear submarine fleet. The 25-year
failure of the nuclear powers to comply with the NPT requirements
for swift and complete disarmament precipitated a fierce debate
within the UN and provided further incentive for the call to ban
the bomb altogether.
During April, 1995, representatives from more than 1,000
United Nations non-governmental organizations (NGOs),
representing more than 14 million people worldwide, held a
conference to discuss the NPT hearings which were simultaneously
being conducted by the U.N.
Representatives from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, in opening the
proceedings, spoke movingly of the inherent illegality and
inhumanity of nuclear weapons. The walls of the conference rooms
were hung with a selection of photographs of the Japanese
bombings that the Smithsonian Institution had refused to display
at its exhibition in Washington, D.C.
Most of those attending the conference, held at the U.N.
Church Center, were also taking part in the official NPT hearings
across the street at the U.N.
In its May-June 1995 issue, the WAR & PEACE DIGEST printed the
following cover story:
ABOLITION BY 2000
NPT Convention Asked to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
Kevin Sanders
Representatives from more than 1,000 United Nations
non-governmental organizations (NGOs) announced at the Nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty conference in April that they are
calling for immediate negotiations for an international
convention to abolish all nuclear weapons, with negotiations to
be concluded by the year 2000.
In announcing the move, the NGO Abolition Caucus said, "A world
free of nuclear weapons is a shared aspiration of humanity. This
goal cannot be achieved in a non-proliferation regime that
authorizes the possession of nuclear weapons by a small group of
states.... Our objective is the definite and unconditional
abolition of nuclear weapons."
The organizations belonging to the caucus represent a
constituency of more than 14 million people worldwide. The
presence of these organizations at the NPT conference proved a
significant voice on behalf of those yearning for a nuclear-free
world.
The caucus' call was the first formal proposal at the UN to go
beyond the traditional call for "disarmament" and specify that
all nuclear weapons should be "abolished."
The proposals of the NGO Nuclear Abolition Caucus include the
following measures:
1. The phased elimination of all nuclear weapons;
2. An unconditional pledge not to use or threaten to use
nuclear weapons;
3. A truly comprehensive test ban with zero threshold;
4. Cease to produce new nuclear weapons and dismantle existing
stockpiles;
5. Prohibit nuclear weapons research, including laboratory
testing;
6. Create additional nuclear weapon-free zones;
7. Prohibitmilitary andcommercial production and reprocessing
of all weapons-usable nuclear materials;
8. Establish an international agency to support the development
of sustainable and environmentally safe energy sources;
9. Create mechanisms to ensure the participation of citizens
and Egos in planning and monitoring abolition of nuclear weapons;
10. Recognize and declare the illegality of threat or use of
nuclear weapons publicly and before the World Court.