Nuclear Ban Treaty

One hundred and twenty-three nations voted to move forward with negotiations to prohibit nuclear weapons—just as the world has already done for biological and chemical weapons. In a historic vote on October 27 at the United Nations Committee for Disarmament,…

Last week something historic happened at the United Nations. Despite enormous pressure from the United States, 123 nations, all with equal standing at the UN General Assembly, voted to start a process in 2017 to negotiate a ban on nuclear…

The United Nations today adopted a landmark resolution to launch negotiations in 2017 on a treaty outlawing nuclear weapons. This historic decision heralds an end to two decades of paralysis in multilateral nuclear disarmament efforts. At a meeting of the First Committee…

European Union’s legislature takes clear stance on upcoming negotiations on international treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons: the EU’s Member States should “support the convening” and “participate substantively” in its negotiation.  Today the European Parliament took a clear stance to support…

It’s time This week, delegations to the UN General Assembly could help shift the course of history. This sounds dramatic, especially for First Committee. While it always presents a good opportunity for progress, First Committee can sometimes seem like a…

A group of governments have submitted a draft UN General Assembly resolution to start negotiations on a treaty banning nuclear weapons. The document was circulated on Wednesday by its lead sponsors Austria, Mexico, South Africa, Ireland, Brazil and Nigeria and…

Austria’s foreign minister, Sebastian Kurz, announced on Wednesday that his country would join other UN member states in tabling a resolution next month to convene negotiations on a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons in 2017. Speaking in the…

The final day of the open-ended working on nuclear disarmament (OEWG) was a picture of diplomatic theatre. At the last moment the Australian delegation tried to upset the process by demanding a vote on what all other delegations believed was…

United Nations disarmament talks concluded in Geneva on Friday 19th of August with the overwhelming majority of nations signalling their intention to launch negotiations in 2017 for a global ban on nuclear weapons. One hundred and seven nations in Africa,…

By Greg Mello of the Los Alamos Study Group. On the eve of the August meeting of the 2016 Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG) in Geneva.  We very much hope that the siren songs advocating meaningless “alternatives” to banning nuclear weapons…