Over 120 UN Members Agree Ban On Nuclear Weapons

Most of the United Nations member countries have agreed to a treaty to ban nuclear weapons at the UN headquarters in New York City.

The treaty was approved by 122 votes while Netherlands opposed and Singapore abstained. United States, United Kingdom, China, Russia, France, North Korea, Pakistan, India and Israel were absent from the negotiations even though they are recognized as possessing nuclear weapons.

Most of the NATO member countries were absent too from the historic negotiations initiated by Brazil, Austria, South Africa, Mexico and New Zealand.

Japan too opted to remain out of the negotiations even though being a victim of atomic attacks in 1945 with bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Elayne Whyte Gomez, president of the UN conference, said seven decades have passed when Japan was attacked with atomic bombs and the world knows power of destruction of nuclear weapons.

She added further, “It is a very clear statement that the international community wants to move to a completely different security paradigm that does not include nuclear weapons.”

Meanwhile, it is learned the treaty is extensive and demands from the signatories complete prohibition from developing, manufacturing, testing and possessing of nuclear weapons.

The countries cannot threaten to use nuclear weapons too and are prohibited from transferring nuclear weapons.

The ten-page treaty will open for signatures later this year on September 20 and need to be ratified by fifty states to become an international law.

However, countries like Britain and United States argue the treaty disregards the realities of the international security environment.