PEOPLE FOR NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT

PEOPLE FOR NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT

UNITED NATIONS STATEMENT ON CATASTROPHIC HUMANITARIAN CONSEQUENCES OF
NUCLEAR WEAPONS USE WELCOMED

NUCLEAR WEAPONS STILL A THREAT TO HUMAN SURVIVAL SAY 124 GOVERNMENTS


People for Nuclear Disarmament has strongly welcomed the joint statement
made by New Zealand at the United Nations First Committee on behalf
of 124 governments, on catastrophic humanitarian consequences of
nuclear weapons use.

A similar statement signed by 17 governments was coordinated by
Australia.

According to PND nuclear weapons campaigner John Hallam, who has campaigned
over the years at the United Nations, and whose work has resulted in
a resolution on the General Assembly on accidental nuclear war,  
“The Joint Statement coordinated by NZ follows on from similar statements
that have come from last years General Assembly, signed by 32
governments, and last May's NPT meeting in Geneva, signed by 80
governments.”
“The joint Statement correctly points to the existential nature of the
threat posed by large-scale nuclear weapons use, and in a number of
places from 1955 onwards states that many authorities including the
UN itself have said that nuclear weapons are a potential threat to
human survival. There is no reasonable doubt that this is so.”
“The use of the nuclear arsenals held by India and Pakistan, assuming each
of them has approximately 100 Hiroshima – sized weapons each, would
lead to a 'nuclear autumn' in which up to a billion people could
still die of famine resulting from the climatic effects of the 5
million tonnes or so of very black soot lofted into the upper
stratosphere from burning cities in South Asia – itself producing a
body – count of up to 150 million.”
“The use of the 2000 or so warheads each kept on high alert by the US and
Russia, each of them 10-20 times the size of the Hiroshima warhead,
would according to peer-reviewed climate modeling that uses the same
climate models as those used to model global warming, create the
coldest conditions since the last ice – age, and these would last
approximately a decade.”

“That nuclear weapons represent a potential threat to human life and to
what we call civilization is not a new idea, but it is one that has
been assuming greater and greater prominence in United Nations forums
and nuclear disarmament meetings.”

“Nuclear weapons are about as valuable to human security as a suicide –
vest. It is high time they were gotten rid of, and the apocalypse
taken off the global agenda.”

A statement welcoming the Joint Statement has also been issued by ICAN.
(See http://www.icanw.org/media/media-releases/)

Contact:
John Hallam 0416-500-793 h61-2-9810-2598
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