WASHINGTON, January 4. / TASS /. The five nuclear countries and the UN Security Council permanent members, Russia, the UK, China, the US and France, have jointly admitted for the first time that "a nuclear war could not be won and must never be fought," leaders and founders of the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) nonprofit organization Ernest Moniz and Sam Nunn stated.
"Today’s clear and direct statement represents the first time all five of the world’s recognized nuclear-weapon states under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) have together affirmed this fundamental principle, establishing an important foundation for reinvigorated efforts to reduce the risk of nuclear conflict," the statement reads.
The NTI chiefs called on the world leaders to "instruct their governments to take concrete steps to this end." The US organization considers it necessary to "accelerate individual and collective efforts to reduce the risk of nuclear use by strengthening safeguards that could prevent unauthorized, inadvertent or mistaken use of a nuclear weapon." According to the experts, it is crucial to "expand and deepen dialogue on risk reduction in bilateral and multilateral channels" as well as to "reduce the role of nuclear weapons in national security doctrines and postures" of states. Moniz and Nunn also stressed the need to "further reduce nuclear arsenals, beginning with negotiations and agreement between the United States and Russia on a successor to New START that further limits and reduces the arsenals of both."
P5 Statement
On Monday, the leaders of the five nuclear powers and permanent members of the United Nations Security Council adopted a joint statement. The leaders emphasized that they consider "the avoidance of war between Nuclear-Weapon States and the reduction of strategic risks as our foremost responsibilities." They affirmed that "a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought." They spoke out against the further spread of nuclear weapons and underlined their "desire to work with all states to create a security environment."
The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, also called Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, was signed in 1968. It made the nuclear arsenals of the United Kingdom, Russia, China, France, and the United States legal, confirming their status as nuclear-weapon states. Other countries agreed to "forgo developing or acquiring nuclear weapons." The treaty has been signed by more than 190 countries. India, Pakistan, and Israel remain outside the treaty. In January 2003, North Korea withdrew from it.