In Video Message for Disarmament Conference, Secretary-General Demands End to Nuclear Weapon Threat, Calling Setbacks ‘Reason to Try Harder’

Following is the text of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s video message for the twenty-fifth United Nations Conference on Disarmament Issues, in Hiroshima City, Japan, 26-28 August:

Excellences, ladies and gentlemen,

I am pleased to send greetings to all participants at this important twenty-fifth United Nations Conference on Disarmament Issues.

Your venue is especially fitting, as we recently commemorated the seventieth anniversary of the devastating bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Here and now we remember the terrible suffering of the survivors — as well as their passionate call for action.  I join the hibakusha and others around the world demanding a nuclear-weapon-free future.

This year also marks the seventieth anniversary of the United Nations.  It is a time to return to our founding mission to prevent war — and to renew our pledge to achieve peace.

Our world will not be safe until we end the nuclear threat.

Some say this is impossible.  I say no.  Setbacks and stalemates are not a cause to give up — they are a reason to try harder.

We need bold, innovative solutions that will narrow our differences and find common ground.

I urge you to use this Conference to bring us all closer to a nuclear-weapon-free world.

Thank you.