UN adopts treaty banning N-arms, India skips talks

The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, the first multilateral legally-binding instrument for nuke disarmament, have been negotiated in 20 years

Over 120 countries have voted in the UN to adopt the first-ever global treaty to ban nuclear weapons, even as India and other nuclear powers including the US, China and Pakistan boycotted the negotiations for the legally binding instrument to prohibit atomic weapons.

The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, the first multilateral legally-binding instrument for nuclear disarmament to have been negotiated in 20 years, was adopted on Friday amid cheers and applause by a vote of 122 in favour to one against (Netherlands) and one abstention (Singapore).

India and other nucleararmed nations -- the United States, Russia, Britain, China, France, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel had not participated in the negotiations.

A substantive session was held in March this year to negotiate the legally binding instrument aimed at prohibiting nuclear weapons.

In October last year, more than 120 nations had voted on a UN General Assembly resolution to convene a conference to negotiate the legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total elimination.

India had abstained from voting on that resolution.

In its Explanation of Vote (EoV) given for its abstention on the resolution in October, India had said that it was "not convinced" that the proposed conference could address the longstanding expectation of the international community for a comprehensive instrument on nuclear disarmament. India also maintained that the Genevabased Conference on Disarmament (CD) is the single multilateral disarmament negotiation forum.

It had further said that it supports the commencement of negotiations in the Conference on Disarmament on a Comprehensive Nuclear Weapons Convention, which in addition to prohibition and elimination also includes verification.

Underlining that international verification was essential to the global elimination of nuclear weapons, India had said it feels that the current process did not include the verification aspect.

In line with its position that India articulated in the EoV, the country had decided not to participate in the negotiations for the treaty.