The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) has been ratified by 50 countries, and will now enter into force on 22nd January 2021, 90 days after its 50th ratification was lodged at the United Nations. The Treaty was negotiated in 2017 with the backing of 122 countries, following a UN motion proposed by Ireland and 5 other states calling for talks on a new legal instrument to outlaw nuclear weapons.
For the first time under international law, the treaty explicitly bans the use, development, testing, production, acquisition, possession, stockpiling, transferring, receiving, threat of use and deployment of nuclear weapons. It also prohibits the provision of assistance to others to do any of these banned actions and provides a pathway to disarmament for states which possess nuclear weapons.
Ireland ratified the TPNW on 6th August 2020, the 75th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, and has already transposed its provisions into Irish law in the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons Act (2019).
Welcoming the news that the Treaty has reached the threshold for entry into force, Irish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament chairperson, Dr David Hutchinson Edgar said: "This is a momentous step on the road to a world free of nuclear weapons. There is now an irrefutable international norm against nuclear weapons. While that will not bring about disarmament overnight, it clearly de-legitimises their development and possession.
"Nuclear weapons are the most deadly, devastating and indiscriminate weapons ever developed. It is high time, 75 years after they were first used, that they were consigned to history forever. They are a prime example of the misapplication of scientific technology. The money and effort which has gone into their development and maintenance should now be diverted to tackling the other man-made existential crises facing the planet in the form of the climate crisis and biodiversity loss."
Irish CND pays tribute to the tireless work of many campaigners, especially the hibakusha who survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, many of whom have dedicated their lives - often despite serious health impacts from the bombing - to working to ensure that no future generation would have to endure the horrors they suffered.
The work of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN - Nobel Peace Prize 2017), of which Irish CND is a partner organisation, deserves particular praise, in facilitating the development of a focussed global network of campaigners, working together towards the clear goal of the abolition of nuclear weapons. ICAN’s Executive Director Beatrice Fihn welcomed the historic moment. “This is a new chapter for nuclear disarmament. Decades of activism have achieved what many said was impossible: nuclear weapons are banned," she said.
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| ICAN Executive Director Beatrice Fihn and Setsuko Thurlow, who survived the Hiroshima bomb as a child, accept the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize. |
Irish CND commends the Irish government for its international leadership in the negotiation of the TPNW and the process leading to its entry into force. It is very much to be welcomed that all shades of Irish political opinion have put their support firmly behind the TPNW, and have emphasised its importance in providing the framework for disarmament which the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) lacks.
Irish CND wholeheartedly endorses the words of Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney, who stated*: "The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons offers us a path to nuclear disarmament by finally putting in place a workable legal framework for the total elimination of nuclear weapons. The Treaty is fully complementary with the NPT. The TPNW strengthens and reinforces the NPT and reaffirms it as the cornerstone of the disarmament and non-proliferation regime. It is a facilitator, not an impediment to progress. As recognised in the NPT, TPNW and throughout the discussions on the humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons, the only true guarantee against the horrors of nuclear war is the total elimination of nuclear weapons."
*Speech by Minister Simon Coveney, to the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, 25th February 2019.
