World must seize on new momentum for nuclear disarmament - UN official
30 September 2009 – The international community must seize the momentum created by last week’s Security Council summit on nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament chaired by United States President Barack Obama, a senior United Nations official said today.
“The international community needs to act firmly to counter the dangers that additional countries and even terrorists might one day acquire weapons of mass destruction,” UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs Sergio Duarte told a news briefing at UN Headquarters in New York.
“We have been witnessing a new wave of interest in disarmament talks, the advancement of these talks,” he said of the Council meeting, which unanimously called on countries to sign and ratify the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and created additional deterrence for withdrawal from the treaty.
It further called on all States to refrain from conducting a nuclear test explosion and to sign and ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), thereby bringing it into force as soon as possible.
“The summit has opened a new chapter in the efforts of the Council to address non-proliferation,” Mr. Duarte said. “I think its main result, its main impact is that it brought disarmament and non-proliferation to the forefront of the international agenda and brought it also back to the United Nations…
“The international community should seize and build on this momentum towards achieving nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament in general,” he added, declaring that the meeting showed the commitment of the US and other Council members to contain proliferation and rededicate themselves to the goal of nuclear disarmament.
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