Nuclear weapons do not give us peace

RECENTLY 30 or so Loughborough residents gathered in St Peter’s, Storer Rd, to discuss the question of whether nuclear weapons keep us safer or put us in more danger.

First we heard a speaker from ICAN (the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear weapons) an organisation which recently won the Nobel Peace Prize, about the process of making these weapons illegal. As a result of a recent United Nations conference nuclear weapons, along with landmines, cluster bombs and chemical and biological weapons, are now outlawed under international law. The UK, along with the US, Russia and other nuclear states, stayed away.

We also heard from Mayors for Peace (Leaders for Peace in the UK) about local initiatives including nuclear-free zones, of which Leicester is one.

These initiatives may not seem to achieve much but they are important steps along the road to ridding the world of nuclear weapons, an outcome surely to be desired as the current stand-off between the US and North Korea escalates by the day.

It was an interesting debate, but it would have been good to hear from those on the other side of the argument.

Speakers were invited, including Nicky Morgan and local councillors, but were unable to attend. Perhaps they would have objected that nuclear weapons have kept the peace since 1945. Have they? Tell that to the people of Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam.

They haven’t even kept the peace in Europe, as the people of the Balkans will testify.

Nuclear weapons played no part in either preventing or pursuing these conflicts; therefore they are strategically pointless.

And as the UK is inevitably drawn in to the US/North Korea standoff, we need now more than ever to say ‘ no more.

Nuclear weapons are pointless, expensive and a threat to life on earth. We must abolish them.’

Liz Gray Frederick St Loughborough

NUCLEAR weapons are designed to make nations afraid of each other.

The United States has been threatening North Korea for a long time, and now South Korea and Japan are afraid of the threatening behaviour of North Korea.

It seems as if all nations are afraid of each other. Lots of people, including the UK Government, seem to think that having nuclear weapons gives us peace; but surely, if we’re afraid, then we’re not at peace.

The Nuclear Ban Treaty recently proposed by the United Nations is a strong move towards reducing fear and starting to develop trust, but our Government and press seem determined to ignore it. So Loughborough with the title ‘Can nuclear weapons bring us security?’

The Treaty requires all ratifying countries “never under any circumstances to develop, test, produce, manufacture, otherwise acquire, possess or stockpile nuclear weapons....”

The heart of the treaty is to prohibit the threat to use nuclear weapons, and there are detailed plans for ensuring and monitoring compliance. 122 nations have signed, and many are ratifying their total support, but at the moment the nine countries who already possess nuclear weapons are ignoring it.

Our first speaker was Elizabeth Minor, who works for the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (www.icanw.org).

ICAN has just been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their work all over the world. They help local communities understand the appalling agony Hiroshima and Nagasaki suffered in 1945, and how the nucleararmed states (US, UK, France, Russia, China) have not brought peace in the years since then, but simply played out their aggression by fighting each other in other countries – Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Afghanistan, Syria and many others – with heavy civilian losses.

She was followed by Sean Morris from Mayors for Peace (www.mayorsforpeace.org), established in 1982 to promote ‘nuclear-free local authorities’ raising awareness of how we can work locally towards a more peaceful world. The initiative has helped to challenge local violence as well as international.

There was a lot of discussion, and we started to talk about what we should do next to open up the debate in public, and to urge a debate in Parliament.

David Paterson Loughborough Peace Group