122 of the 193 member countries of the United Nations on 7 July at the plenary meeting in the headquarters in new York adopted a multilateral Treaty banning nuclear weapons. This was reported on the UN website, the TV channel “112 Ukraine”.
Voted against the Netherlands, and Singapore abstained. None of the nine countries possessing nuclear weapons: USA, Russia, Britain, China, France, India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel – did not participate in the negotiations on the text of the Treaty and vote. This was also the position of Germany and other countries – members of NATO, says DW.
Representatives of the UN, US, UK and France in a joint statement stressed that the agreement “ignores the realities of the international security environment,” but because the country does not intend to sign or ratify the Treaty.
According to the text of the Treaty, States signatories undertake never to develop and not to possess nuclear weapons. Countries are also prohibited from transferring weapons or to threaten them.
The Treaty States that “most countries of the world no longer regards nuclear weapons as legitimate means of warfare”. The agreement commits to help the victims of the testing and use of nuclear weapons.
The document will be open for signature until 20 September 2017 and will enter into force after it is ratified by at least 50 countries.
According to the report of the Stockholm international Institute for peace studies (SIPRI), nine nuclear States of the world hold about 14 935 nuclear warheads.
We will remind that the decision on the preparation of the Treaty adopted at the UN General Assembly. It happened in December 2016. The resolution was signed by representatives of 123 States, while the nuclear powers, including Russia and about 30 countries, voted against. China has become one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council who abstained in the vote.
The resolution decided to hold a conference with a view to developing “a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, which will lead to its complete elimination”.
Intergovernmental negotiations on the elaboration of a Treaty banning nuclear weapons, which began in March this year, was held without the participation of a number of countries, including USA and Russia.
