Disarmament

The following statement was issued today by the Spokesman for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon:

After weeks of intense debate, States parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) concluded the month-long 2015 Review Conference this evening, unable to reach consensus on an outcome text that would have delineated steps to speed progress on nuclear disarmament, advance non-proliferation and work towards a nuclear-weapon-free zone in the Middle East.

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks to the Security Council’s open debate on small arms and light weapons, held in New York on 13 May:

Following is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s message, as delivered by Virginia Gamba, Deputy to the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, to the launch of the Global Zero Action Corps, today, in Washington, D.C.:

Fervent calls by survivors and activists for genuine and sustained efforts towards the abolition of nuclear weapons dominated the 2015 Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) today, as non-governmental organizations addressed delegates at Headquarters.

Considering that there were enough nuclear weapons to put an end to the whole planet in minutes without anyone or anything able to help, nuclear doctrines were therefore “doctrines of death” in which “all were losers,” the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference heard today during its fourth day of deliberations.

Hopes of achieving the universality of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) were becoming “ever more remote” amid new challenges to the global security architecture and a general slackening of political will, its Review Conference heard today, as State parties continued a third day of deliberations.

Following is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s message, delivered by Angela Kane, High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, to the symposium entitled “The Non-Proliferation Treaty, Nuclear Disarmament, Non-Proliferation and Energy:  Fresh Ideas for the Future”, in New York today:

“No State or international body could address the immediate humanitarian emergency caused by a nuclear weapon detonation or provide adequate assistance to victims,” Austria’s Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurtz told delegates today, as the month-long Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) reconvened.

Describing a nuclear-weapon-free world as a “critical global public good”, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged the international community to work towards ensuring that the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) retained its central role in collective security, as the month-long ninth Review Conference of that accord began at Headquarters today.