Nuclear possession

Peace can never be achieved this way a) The issue is about peace, not only nuclear weapons. The US has not been willing to sign a peace agreement after all these years. After some kind of peace process and treaty has been achieved, you can turn to the specific issue of nuclear weapons. b) Making peace takes time, thorough preparations, lots of different expertise, long consultations and only face-to-face meetings when all are sure that, when the parties finally meet at top level, some kind of deal will be signed. c) This would have been an issue for the UN if it were respected and used fairly by member states around the world. Naive and egotist people believe they can do miracles without the institutions of the international system. Probably Trump and Kim are in the same category believing that they are all capable and great guys of history (worthy...

By Dragana Maksimovic January 28, 2019 The author, MA student at University of Belgrade, become a TFF Associate in 2018. More here. There is one thing about which many peace researchers disagree and constantly debate: Are we really living in the most peaceful era ever, or are we facing a dangerous era of conflicts and struggles for global supremacy – very often masked as a fight for human rights but which can lead to a global war? There are those who agree with Steven Pinker when he claims that “today we are living in a most peaceful time in our species’ existence” (1) or with Barack Obama, the 44th president of The United States, who wanted to highlight how “worth it is reminding ourselves of how lucky we are to be living in the most peaceful, most prosperous, most progressive era in human history.’’ (2) Trying to validate his claims,...

  Reacting to the radio interview by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, to mark Armistice Day, in which he was reported as saying, “We have to protect ourselves with respect to China, Russia and even the United States of America… We need a true European army”, President Donald Trump blew a fuse. He tweeted: “President Macron of France has just suggested that Europe build its own military in order to protect itself from the U.S., China and Russia. Very insulting.” In fact Trump’s reaction was based on reading a false report of what Macron said. In that part of the interview he was talking about cyber attacks. Nevertheless, Macron was indeed angrily critical of Trump: “When I see President Trump announcing that he’s quitting a major disarmament treaty which was formed after the 1980s Euro-missile crisis that hit Europe, who is the main victim? Europe and its security”. The treaty...

  By Farhang Jahanpour September 26   Last year I wrote that Trump’s speech at the UN General Assembly was perhaps the worst speech ever delivered from that podium, certainly by a Western leader. This year he surpassed himself. Why is there no rule to say that someone who openly violates the basic norms of the United Nations continuously threatens other countries in contravention of the UN Charter’s Article 2.4 condemns internationalism and multilateralism advocates a narrow nationalism/patriotism (to make America great again) stops funding the UNESCO condemns the International Criminal Court (ICC) and threatens its officials withdraws from UNRWA withdraws from the Paris Climate Accord withdraws from the UN Human Rights Commission withdraws from the UN Security Council-based nuclear deal with Iran (JCPOA) etc. – can not automatically expect to remain a member of the UN world body that is in charge of those organisations and advocates those principles...

By David Krieger Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, NAPF August 2018 Nuclear weapons pose a grave threat to the future of civilization. As long as we allow these weapons to exist, we flirt with the catastrophe that they will be used, whether intentionally or accidentally. Meanwhile, nuclear weapons skew social priorities, create imbalances of power, and heighten geopolitical tension. Diplomacy has brought some noteworthy steps in curbing risks and proliferation, but progress has been uneven and tenuous. The ultimate aim of abolishing these weapons from the face of the earth—the “zero option”—faces formidable challenges of ignorance, apathy, and fatigue. Yet, the total abolition of nuclear weapons is essential for a Great Transition to a future rooted in respect for life, global solidarity, and ecological resilience. This will require an emboldened disarmament movement working synergistically with kindred movements, such as those fighting for peace, environmental sustainability, and economic justice, in pursuit of...

  Comment by Jan Oberg RT offers the background and, towards the end, Oberg deals with what it means politically. The U.S. has upheld sanctions on Iran since 1979. When is enough enough? With what right does the country suffocate the 85 million Iranian citizens? Perhaps it is time that you boycott these two companies since they have now decided to contribute more to war than to peace, to support the U.S. in its gross violations of international law (by withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal which is under a UN Security Council resolution) and in its human rights violations – not to speak of threatening sanctions on everybody else who continue to do business with Iran. Watch the show… Some “parameters” may prevent you from using the arrow below. If so click “Watch the show…”    

    Comment “We deeply regret the re-imposition of sanctions by the US, due to the latter’s withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA)” – say High Representative Federica Mogherini and Foreign Ministers of E3 (Jean-Yves Le Drian of France, Heiko Maas of Germany, Jeremy Hunt of the United Kingdom). That’s an important statement. But more is needed. While the EU needs to protect its member states against US attempts to bully and punish everyone who from today deals with Iran, it needs to step up all kinds of co-operation with Iran and be ready to endure whatever conflicts with the U.S. this may entail. The future of the EU is at stake. No less. Also – says Oberg – it is peculiar that the US has chosen August 6, Hiroshima Day, to re-impose its sanctions on Iran in the wake of its decision to withdraw from the...

Photo by Nadav Kander   By Marzhan Nurzhan The CTBTO Youth Group (CYG) holds its second international conference in Kazakh capital city Astana from August 28-30, 2018. The author is a CYG member from Kazakhstan, a convener of Abolition 2000 Youth Network and a PNND Coordinator for CIS countries. This article first appeared in The Astana Times on May 29, 2018 with the title ‘Kazakhstan’s Nuclear Legacy and Importance of CTBTO’. It is being reproduced with the author’s permission. – The Editor.   PRAGUE (IDN) – I am coming from Kazakhstan, the country which inherited around 1,500 nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union making it the 4th biggest nuclear arsenal in the world at the time. For almost half a century, from 1949 until 1989, the Soviet Union conducted 456 nuclear tests above and underground at the Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Site, known also as Semey polygon, in the eastern part...

  – all about this agreement and its text here). Noteworthy is that the nuclear deal is incorporated into international law by UN Security Council Resolution 2231, even though the U.S. already at that point stated – as an exceptionalist state – that it did not consider the deal binding for it. With the exception of Germany, the deal was negotiated – cynically, of course – by countries which have themselves thousands of nuclear weapons. It never mentioned the only state in the region that possesses them, against international law in the form of UN resolutions and, additionally, has not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). That state is Israel whose nuclear weapons Western politicians and their loyal, politically correct media omit mention of – as systematically and uniformly as if orchestrated by an invisible hand from above. Back in 2014-15, many of us stated that the alternative to a negotiated...

By John Buell May 7, 2018 Recently there was an extraordinary moment on corporate TV. Late last month CNN’s Chris Cuomo asked Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: “Does Israel have nuclear capabilities and nuclear weapons, yes or no?” Netanyahu responded evasively, claiming: “we’ve always been the first to say we wouldn’t introduce it so we haven’t introduced it.” After Cuomo continued to press for a “yes or no answer,” Netanyahu said, “That’s as good an answer as you’re going to get.” As The Intercept’s Glenn Greenwald noted in response to the exchange between Cuomo and Netanyahu, “Kudos to @ChrisCuomo for pressing Netanyahu on that little uncomfortable fact that is typically ignored: the only country in the Middle East with a proven, clandestine nuclear weapons stockpile is . . . Israel. And the rogue state refuses to join the NPT.” Originally published by Informed Comment on May 7, 2018, here While...

TEHRAN – Farhang Jahanpour, an adjunct professor in the Department of Continuing Education at the University of Oxford and a Middle East expert, says that all other signatories to the JCPOA, including the European Troika (the UK, France and Germany) have stated that they are for the nuclear accord, since Iran has remained committed to the deal. (JCPOA = Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action = the deal about nuclear technology between Iran and the five UN Security Council members + Germany + EU. You can read it here.) “Nevertheless, EU countries are in a difficult position with the American demands,” Jahanpour tells the Tehran Times in an exclusive interview. Jahanpour, also a former senior research fellow at Harvard University and TFF Board member, says that Europe is playing a double game with Iran. “On the one hand, they [European countries] have stated openly that they support the JCPOA and have...

  Paul Rogers   8 February 2018   The what, when, where of nuclear danger – and the good news about dispelling it.   In the past couple of weeks, the details of the new United States nuclear posture have been published, Trump has delivered a belligerent state-of-the-union address and, most significant of all, the authoritative Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has moved the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock to two minutes to midnight. Originally published at openDemocracy   This is the closest the clock has been to “doomsday” since the US and Soviet Union started testing immensely destructive H-bombs in the early 1950s. Now, after thirty years of an apparent easing of nuclear tensions since the end of the cold war, fear of nuclear war is real and pressing. In recent months I’ve written some specific pieces on the nuclear issue for openDemocracy, mostly related to North Korea...