Nuclear treaty signed, but you might not know it

LAST Friday a very important document was signed at the United Nations, but you wouldn’t think so from the amount of coverage in the British press.

It was a Treaty to ban nuclear weapons, a multilateral agreement for which we’ve been waiting for nearly 70 years.

Negotiations open to all UN member states started last November and the text was signed by 122 nations (1/3 of the 193 member states) last Friday.

It’s not a magic wand (‘wave it and poof! all the nightmares go away); this treaty is about strengthening the realisation that nuclear war is a terrifying prospect, never to be seriously contemplated. It’s about keeping up our hopes that humanity can overcome its historical cycle of mass bloodshed.

The United Nations sent out a press release when the document was signed. Several international newspapers have used it, but no British newspaper.

Here are some excerpts. I have the full text and you can find it on time. com/ 4849159/ unitednations-nuclear-weapons-treaty/

I also have the full text of the Treaty (10 pages, 20 Articles) which I can email to you on request.

‘United Nations Nuclear Ban Treaty’

“The heart of this treaty is the prohibition on threatening to use nuclear weapons. It requires all ratifying countries ‘never under any circumstances to develop, test, produce, manufacture, otherwise acquire, possess or stockpile nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices.’

None of the nine countries known or believed to possess nuclear weapons — the United States, Russia, Britain, China, France, India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel — is supporting the treaty. Instead, the United States wants to strengthen and reaffirm the nearly half-centuryold Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which sought to prevent the spread of atomic arms beyond the five original powers — the U.S., Russia, Britain, France and China. It requires non-nuclear signatory nations not to pursue atomic weapons, and commits the five nuclear powers to move toward nuclear disarmament.”

But the nuclear powers have failed to keep their part of the bargain, the nuclear arms race has continued, and proliferation has happened, notably India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea.

Britain is among this handful of countries who hang on to our nuclear weapons and spend colossal sums of money on them so that we can threaten each other and the world. 15,000 nuclear weapons, each one capable of killing a million people.

I believe that we should bring this issue into the open.

We should ask our MPs of whatever party to make sure there is an adequate debate in Parliament about this country’s future involvement in the progress of this Treaty.

In Loughborough our Peace Group can be contacted through my telephone number or email: 07557 522 914

davidpaterson130@gmail.com David Paterson Gladstone Avenue Loughborough