Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Category: Nuclear Abolition

  • 2014 Hiroshima Peace Declaration

    hiroshimaSummer, 69 years later. The burning sun takes us back to “that day.” August 6, 1945. A single atomic bomb renders Hiroshima a burnt plain. From infants to the elderly, tens of thousands of innocent civilians lose their lives in a single day. By the end of the year, 140,000 have died. To avoid forgetting that sacred sacrifice and to prevent a repetition of that tragedy, please listen to the voices of the survivors.

    Approximately 6,000 young boys and girls died removing buildings for fire lanes. One who was a 12-year-old junior high student at the time says, “Even now, I carry the scars of war and that atomic bombing on my body and in my heart. Nearly all my classmates were killed instantly. My heart is tortured by guilt when I think how badly they wanted to live and that I was the only one who did.” Having somehow survived, hibakusha still suffer from severe physical and emotional wounds.

    “Water, please.” Voices from the brink of death are still lodged in the memory of a boy who was 15 and a junior high student. The pleas were from younger students who had been demolishing buildings. Seeing their badly burned, grotesquely swollen faces, eyebrows and eyelashes singed off, school uniforms in ragged tatters due to the heat ray, he tried to respond but was stopped.

    “‘Give water when they’re injured that bad and they’ll die, boy,’ so I closed my ears and refused them water. If I had known they were going to die anyway, I would have given them all the water they wanted.” Profound regret persists.

    People who rarely talked about the past because of their ghastly experiences are now, in old age, starting to open up. “I want people to know the true cruelty of war,” says an A-bomb orphan. He tells of children like himself living in a city of ashes, sleeping under bridges, in the corners of burned-out buildings, in bomb shelters, having nothing more than the clothes on their backs, stealing and fighting to eat, not going to school, barely surviving day to day working for gangsters.

    Immediately after the bombing, a 6-year-old first grader hovered on the border between life and death. Later, she lived a continual fearful struggle with radiation aftereffects. She speaks out now because, “I don’t want any young people to go through that experience.” After an exchange with non-Japanese war victims, she decided to convey the importance of “young people making friends around the world,” and “unceasing efforts to build, not a culture of war, but a culture of peace.”

    The “absolute evil” that robbed children of loving families and dreams for the future, plunging their lives into turmoil, is not susceptible to threats and counter-threats, killing and being killed. Military force just gives rise to new cycles of hatred. To eliminate the evil, we must transcend nationality, race, religion, and other differences, value person-to-person relationships, and build a world that allows forward-looking dialogue.

    Hiroshima asks everyone throughout the world to accept this wish of the hibakusha and walk with them the path to nuclear weapons abolition and world peace.

    Each one of us will help determine the future of the human family. Please put yourself in the place of the hibakusha. Imagine their experiences, including that day from the depths of hell, actually happening to you or someone in your family. To make sure the tragedies of Hiroshima and Nagasaki never happen a third time, let’s all communicate, think and act together with the hibakusha for a peaceful world without nuclear weapons and without war.

    We will do our best. Mayors for Peace, now with over 6,200 member cities, will work through lead cities representing us in their parts of the world and in conjunction with NGOs and the UN to disseminate the facts of the bombings and the message of Hiroshima. We will steadfastly promote the new movement stressing the humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons and seeking to outlaw them. We will help strengthen international public demand for the start of negotiations on a nuclear weapons convention with the goal of total abolition by 2020.

    The Hiroshima Statement that emerged this past April from the ministerial meeting of the NPDI (Non-Proliferation and Disarmament Initiative) called on the world’s policymakers to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki. President Obama and all leaders of nuclear-armed nations, please respond to that call by visiting the A-bombed cities as soon as possible to see what happened with your own eyes.

    If you do, you will be convinced that nuclear weapons are an absolute evil that must no longer be allowed to exist. Please stop using the inhumane threat of this absolute evil to defend your countries. Rather, apply all your resources to a new security system based on trust and dialogue.

    Japan is the only A-bombed nation. Precisely because our security situation is increasingly severe, our government should accept the full weight of the fact that we have avoided war for 69 years thanks to the noble pacifism of the Japanese Constitution. We must continue as a nation of peace in both word and deed, working with other countries toward the new security system. Looking toward next year’s NPT Review Conference, Japan should bridge the gap between the nuclear-weapon and non-nuclear-weapon states to strengthen the NPT regime. In addition, I ask the government to expand the “black rain areas” and, by providing more caring assistance, show more compassion for the hibakusha and all those suffering from the effects of radiation.

    Here and now, as we offer our heartfelt consolation to the souls of those sacrificed to the atomic bomb, we pledge to join forces with people the world over seeking the abolition of the absolute evil, nuclear weapons, and the realization of lasting world peace.

  • A Small Republic with Big Principles

    Robert LaneyWhen one is called upon to speak on Sadako Peace Day concerning the necessity of peace in the nuclear age, what can one say that has not been said many times before by speakers more knowledgeable and eloquent than oneself? In this connection I am fortunate that the year 2014 is witnessing a little publicized but unique and potentially historic development in the long campaign for nuclear disarmament. But before we discuss this development, let us consider the meaning of Sadako Peace Day and our purpose in gathering at this lovely spot every year on August 6th.

    Of course you know that August 6, 1945 was the day that the U. S. Army Air Corps dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. This was the first use of this new and most dreadful form of weaponry in war. Please forgive a few gruesome statistics which I hope will add some context to our gathering today. The atomic bombing of Hiroshima caused approximately 90,000 deaths immediately and an additional 50,000 deaths by the end of the year. You also know that three days later on August 9th, the Army Air Corps dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Nagasaki. This bombing caused approximately 40,000 deaths immediately and an additional 35,000 deaths by the end of the year.

    [Parenthetically you may not realize that during the three day period between these two events, the victorious allies in Europe – the United States, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, and France – agreed to put certain Nazi leaders on trial at Nuremberg for war crimes. Whether the irony of this timing occurred to any of the allies at the time is a question I shall leave to the historians.]

    In any case at the time of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, a little two-year-old girl by the name of Sadako Sasaki was living in the city with her family. Although Sadako was not overtly hurt at the time of the bombing, nine years later in November of 1954 she developed swellings on her neck and behind her ears. By January of 1955 purple spots had formed on her legs. By February Sadako, then age 12, had been diagnosed with leukemia and was hospitalized at the Red Cross Hospital in Hiroshima. During that summer Sadako’s best friend came to visit her. Her friend brought a square piece of gold paper and reminded Sadako of the ancient Japanese legend that promises to anyone who folds a thousand paper cranes that she will be granted a wish. So Sadako began folding cranes. On one of the cranes she wrote the words, “I shall write peace on their wings, and they will fly all over the world.” The story goes that Sadako was able to fold 644 cranes before she passed away in October of that year at the age of 12. Her many friends and schoolmates then took upon themselves to complete the 1,000 cranes and buried them with her.

    Sadako was among many Japanese citizens, especially children, who developed leukemia after the atomic bombings. By the early 1950s it was clear that this unusually high incidence of leukemia had been caused by radiation exposure.

    Today there is a statue of Sadako at the Peace Park in Hiroshima which depicts her holding a golden paper crane. At the foot of the statue is a plaque that reads: “This is our cry. This is our prayer. Peace in the world.” Sadako’s story is famous among the Japanese, who regard her as a symbol of all the children who died from the effects of the atomic bombs. Today people all over Japan celebrate August 6th as their annual peace day. We at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation believe it only fitting that we follow their example by gathering at this little peace park for our own remembrance of those events and to ponder their meaning for us today.

    Of course many of the survivors of the atomic bombs are still living today. In Japan these survivors are known as “Hibakusha,” which means “explosion-affected people.” Some of these Hibakusha have devoted their lives to raising public awareness of the dangers of nuclear war and of the potential effects of nuclear weapons. [If there are any Hibakusha here today, would you please rise so that we may recognize you and express our appreciation?]

    Now let me explain why I believe the abolition of nuclear weapons is so important. In a nutshell, I believe that a world without nuclear weapons – a world of “Nuclear Zero,” as we say at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation – would be far more safe and secure for everyone than the world we live in today. It seems to me that this proposition is unassailable because there is no threat that any nation faces from any other nation or group for which the use of nuclear weapons would not make the problem worse – far worse – even for the nation using the weapons. Let me repeat: a world with zero nuclear weapons would be far more safe and secure for everyone than the world we live in today.

    This brings me to my second proposition: nuclear weapons are simply too dangerous to be in the possession of fallible human beings. We all know that military forces, like all human organizations, are prone to accidents, mistakes, misperceptions, and mental and emotional disorders. The recent destruction of the civilian airliner over eastern Ukraine is only one of a long train of tragic examples that we could point to. To mention a comparable tragedy, in 1988 the U.S. Navy destroyed a civilian airliner by mistake over the Persian Gulf, causing a total loss of life similar to that in the Ukraine tragedy. With respect to nuclear weapons, for those who are not convinced that we are living on borrowed time after a series of narrowly averted catastrophes during the nuclear age, the history to read is Command and Control by Eric Schlosser. In our hubris as a society and as a species, we are living with the illusion that human beings have a god-like capacity to maintain and deploy nuclear weapons without serious risk of accidents, mistakes, misperceptions, and mental and emotional disorders.

    Now let me switch gears and tell you about a small but proud nation in the northwestern Pacific known as the Republic of the Marshall Islands. This small island nation consists of 24 coral atolls and is home to approximately 70,000 people. During the 12-year period from 1946 through 1958 the U. S. Government used the Marshall Islands as a testing ground, first for atomic weapons, and later for far more powerful thermonuclear weapons. During this period the Government exploded a total of 67 of these weapons in the Marshall Islands. The horrific environmental and health effects of these tests are still a daily experience for many in these Islands today.

    Fast forward to 1962, when the Cuban missile crisis brought the United States and the Soviet Union so close to nuclear war that they saw the need to bring this potentially catastrophic risk under control. The result was a grand, worldwide treaty, imprecisely known as the “Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty,” which came into force in 1970. By this Treaty the great majority of nations of the world promised not to seek or acquire nuclear weapons. Further, those nations and the few nations then in possession of nuclear weapons – the United States, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, France, and China – agreed to negotiate in good faith to terminate the nuclear arms race and to eliminate nuclear weapons from the planet.

    Now, 44 years later, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, a state party to the Treaty, is standing up to the nuclear giants and by its actions is saying to them,

    “Enough is enough. More than forty years ago you, the nuclear giants, promoted and engineered this grand bargain by which the nations without nuclear weapons agreed not to seek or acquire them, and in return you promised to negotiate for nuclear disarmament. Now after more than four decades, the world still waits for these negotiations to begin. Having kept our end of the bargain, we the Republic of the Marshall Islands are taking action against you, the nuclear giants, by initiating lawsuits in the International Court of Justice by which we seek to hold you accountable for your respective failures to negotiate for nuclear disarmament. For jurisdictional purposes we also have initiated a separate lawsuit against the United States in U.S. federal court in San Francisco. Although Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea are not parties to this Treaty, we also have initiated lawsuits against them in the International Court of Justice for their failures to negotiate for nuclear disarmament as required by customary international law. The time has come for you to answer in court for your failures to negotiate for disarmament. We seek no financial compensation from these legal proceedings. We seek only that you be required by the courts to perform your end of the bargain, that is, to negotiate in good faith for nuclear disarmament.”

    That is the effective message of the Republic of the Marshall Islands to the nuclear giants. These lawsuits may seem like something out of Don Quixote – a small country challenging the nuclear giants in courts of law over their failures to negotiate for disarmament. Can small countries really do this? We shall see; like the Apollo moon landings, lawsuits like these have never been attempted before. But when the vast majority of countries enter into a grand bargain in which they promise not to acquire nuclear weapons, and in return the relatively few nuclear giants promise to negotiate for nuclear disarmament, and then more than four decades pass without negotiations for disarmament, to what institutions can the non-nuclear countries turn for help other than the courts? Is enforcing bargains, even grand, multi-national treaties, not a role of the courts? If not, then what is the value of this Treaty, or for that matter any treaty, in world affairs? Our Government likes to speak of “the rule of law” as a necessary feature of a free and just society. And yet if nations do not allow courts of law to judge their performance of their mutual legal obligations, then what does that imply for the rule of law among nations? And in the case of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, what would that imply for the long-term survival of our species?

    Of course challenging the nuclear giants in court over their failures to negotiate for disarmament would entail political and economic risks for any country, large or small. No country can afford to challenge the nuclear giants lightly on such a sensitive and emotional issue. Therefore we at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, with our long-standing commitment to the universal, transparent, irreversible, and verifiable abolition of nuclear weapons from the planet, are especially proud to associate ourselves with this small Republic’s historic and courageous challenge to the continuing possession of nuclear weapons by a very few rogue nations.

    As you surely recognize, there is a sense in which the Marshall Islands represent not only their own citizens by these lawsuits, but in the final analysis all of humankind. When the Republic filed these lawsuits on April 24th, their Minister of Foreign Affairs, Tony de Brum, said, “Our people have suffered the catastrophic and irreparable damage of these weapons, and we vow to fight so that no one else on earth will ever again experience these atrocities.” Although the Republic will receive no thanks from the nuclear giants, the rest of us may wish to convey to the Republic our humble gratitude, our admiration, and our moral support. And we might ponder what the example of this small republic with big principles can teach us about moral courage, leadership, the rule of law, and perhaps even the survival of our species.

    For your information the Foundation seeks to keep you current on the progress of these lawsuits through the Foundation’s website wagingpeace.org. In addition the Foundation has established another website, nuclearzero.org, which is dedicated solely to these lawsuits and invites you to sign a petition by which you may register your support. Of course if you have questions, please ask a member of the Staff, myself, or another member of the Board. Based upon our experience since the Marshall Islands filed these lawsuits on April 24th, you should not rely upon the major U.S. news media to keep you informed. Why this should be, I shall leave for you to determine.

    Many thanks for your kind attention.

  • Message on the 69th Anniversaries of the Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

    Sadako Sasaki was a two-year-old child when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.  She died of radiation exposure from the bomb ten years later, when she was twelve years old. In her hospital bed she folded paper cranes in the hope of regaining her health. Japanese legend says it is good fortune to fold 1,000 paper cranes.  On one of the paper cranes she folded, Sadako wrote, “I will write peace on your wings, and you will fly all over the world.”

    Sadako Statue in HiroshimaSadako died with 644 cranes folded.  Her classmates finished the job.  Today there is a statue of Sadako in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park.  Children from all over the world send colorful paper cranes to adorn this statue and other monuments in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and Sadako’s story has inspired young (and older) people all over the world to work for peace and a world free of nuclear weapons.

    Sadako’s paper cranes have flown to Santa Barbara, where we have created a Sadako Peace Garden, and hold an annual ceremony to remember the innocent victims of war.  Surely Sadako’s cranes have flown all over the world and are present wherever people gather to remember the innocent victims of war, including those who died as a result of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

    We remember the past to learn from it so as to not repeat its mistakes.  The only way we can be sure we will not destroy ourselves with nuclear weapons is to eliminate them all.  It is what the nine nuclear-armed countries are obligated to do, and what they must begin now by means of negotiations in good faith for the phased, verifiable, irreversible and transparent elimination of these weapons.  Sixty-nine years of the Nuclear Age is long enough.  It must be ended.

    Let us honor Sadako, as well as the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the victims of nuclear testing, by demanding an end to the modernization and possession of nuclear arms.  Humanity is endangered.  The human future is at risk.  Enough is enough.  We must demand of our leaders that they undertake negotiations in good faith to abolish nuclear weapons if we are to assure that these steel-hearted annihilators will not abolish us.

    I urge you all to stand with the Marshall Islands in their courageous lawsuits against the nine nuclear-armed countries.  You can learn more and support the Marshall Islanders at www.nuclearzero.org.

    When we have achieved the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons, let us set our sights on a world without war and violence and one that is equitable for all and in which human dignity is universally respected and upheld.

  • Open Letter from the Brooklyn Metropolitan Detention Center

    Our Dear Sisters and Brothers,

    We send warm greetings and many thanks to all who actively engage in the transformation of weapons of mass destruction to sustainable life-giving alternatives. Gregory Boertje-Obed (U.S. Penitentiary, Leavenworth, Kansas) Michael Walli (Federal Correctional Institution McKean, Bradford, Pennsylvania) and I are sending you some of our observations and concerns on the 2nd anniversary of our Transform Now Plowshares action.

    Transform Now Ploughshares

     

    On July 28, 2012, after thorough study of nuclear issues, and because of our deepening commitment to nonviolence, we engaged in direct action by cutting through four fences at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where the U.S. continues to overhaul and upgrade thermonuclear warheads.

    On that day, two years ago, when we reached the building where all U.S. highly-enriched (bomb-grade) uranium is stored, we prayed and also wrote messages on the wall, such as “The Fruit of Justice is Peace”. (Realistically, the higher and stronger fences built as a result of our nonviolent incursion can never keep humans safe from inherently dangerous materials and weapons.)  We acted humbly as “creative extremists for love”, to cite one of our most important and revered leaders, Martin Luther King, Jr.

    There are a number of reasons for what we did. We three were acutely mindful of the widespread loss to humanity that nuclear systems have already caused, and we realize that all life on Earth could be exterminated through intentional, accidental, or technical error.

    Our action at the Y-12 site in Oak Ridge exposed the storage of weapons-making materials deliberately hidden from the general public. The production, refurbishment, threat, or use of these weapons of mass destruction violate the fundamental rules and principles by which we all try to live amicably as human beings. The United States Constitution and the Laws of War are intended to ensure the survival of humanity with dignity. However, it is abundantly clear that harmony and cooperation among nations can never be achieved with nuclear weapons. (These arguments, we assume, will be made on our behalf during the eventual appeal of our convictions that accused us of sabotage, though it was never our intention to harm our country.)

    Our “crime” was to draw attention to the criminality of the 70-year-old nuclear industry itself and to the unconscionable fact that the United States spends more on nuclear weapons than on education, health, transportation, and disaster relief combined.

    We three Transform Now Plowshares consider it our duty, right, and privilege to heighten tension in the ongoing debate of Disarmament vs. Deterrence because history has repeatedly taught us that the policy of deterrence doesn’t lead to security, but rather to the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. During our trial, the U.S. prosecutors and the U.S. courts accused the wrong people when they claimed that we violated the law, because what we did was to make America’s citizens aware of egregious preparations for mass murder.

    We took action because we were acutely aware that our government has failed to keep its long-standing promise to pursue nuclear disarmament. (As Ramsey Clark testified during one of our pre-trial hearings, the U.S. entered into the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in the 1960’s because our country was finally facing up to the severe human and environmental consequences of the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as to the hideous results of countless nuclear tests conducted by the U.S. government within and beyond our own borders.)

    One of our pressing concerns is that U.S. prosecutors and the courts adhere to an obsolete view of security with no cognizance – or consciousness – of the horrific effects caused by nuclear weapons. Greg, Mike, and I believe that, undeniably, the U.S. is in a state of denial. It’s what Hannah Arendt called not evil, but the banality of evil. “There’s nothing deep about it. It’s nothing demonic! There’s simply the reluctance ever to imagine what the other person is experiencing, right?” (Hannah Arendt, “Eichmann was Outrageously Stupid” in The Last Interview and Other Conversations, Melville House, Brooklyn 2013, p. 48).

    We citizens cannot permit ourselves to be rendered passive and mute by the banality of evil! Only complete nuclear disarmament can save humanity. At stake is the honor and dignity of the Hibakusha, along with the physical, environmental, emotional, and psychological trauma long suffered by victims of the nuclear system, from uranium miners to down-winders. (From 1946 to 1958, Marshall Islanders were bombarded with 67 atomic and thermonuclear tests that were carried out by the United States.)

    Michael Walli, Greg Boertje-Obed and I are in U.S. prisons because, ironically, our action at Oak Ridge was based on the common sense reality that we human beings have endured more than enough destruction and exploitation. We believe that we citizens can exercise our collective power to consciously transform our nation’s priorities. We all need to actively insist on more humane uses for the billions of dollars now budgeted for the nuclear weapons/industrial complex.

    Two years ago, as we neared the building in Oak Ridge, we were extremely surprised by the ineffectiveness of the system that supposedly guarded our nation’s most important National Security Complex. We believed that we were about to expose the source of unfettered violence that has led to the chronic spiritual and economic decline in the U.S. As it turned out, it was the laxity of the security system at Y-12 that caught the attention of the courts and the mainstream media. Security weakness became the big story. There was no mainstream acknowledgement that the national security complex is rotting from its own irrelevance.

    Most surprisingly, our July 2012 action and our court cases have revealed that it is not the U.S. government that is in control of the nuclear weapons complex, but in reality it is the corporations that are in control through their solicitation and manipulation of endless funding for the refurbishment of unlawful thermonuclear warheads. We three are incarcerated because we stood up to a nuclear weapons industry that is kept thriving by the interlocking and obsolete institutions that subscribe to the long-discredited notion that law and security can be enforced by ever-greater force.

    Regarding the $22.8 billion contract awarded to the Y-12 site in Oak Ridge and the Pantex plant in Texas, for the refurbishment of thermonuclear warheads and a new Uranium Processing Facility (UPF), the relevant corporations don’t actually operate under the long-discredited myth of “nuclear deterrence”. Rather, corporations such as Babcock and Wilcox, Lockheed, and Bechtel operate under limited liability subsidiaries, joint ventures, consortiums, and partnerships for the main purpose of making profits by engaging in huge nuclear weapons production/refurbishment contracts. By this time, Congress certainly is aware that valid contracts can be issued only for the dismantlement of all nuclear weapons and for the environmentally-sound treatment and disposition of all nuclear materials.

    In order for the U.S. to negotiate for nuclear disarmament in good faith, we say it is essential to peaceably transform these very corporations so that they are no longer able to violate the most basic moral and legal principles of civilized society by deliberately precipitating planetary self-destruction.

    We thank you for your letters and your concerns. We ask you to support the Republic of the Marshall Islands in their current legal actions against the United States in U.S. federal court  and against the U.S. and all the other nuclear weapons states in the International Court of Justice, for failure to eliminate their respective nuclear arsenals. You can learn more and add your support by signing the petition at www.nuclearzero.org.

    Blessings,

    Greg, Michael and Megan

  • The Marshall Islands: Sounding a Wake-Up Call

    The Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) is an island country in the northern Pacific with a population of approximately 70,000 people. For such a small country, it is making big waves.  As a country at risk of being submerged due to rising ocean levels, the RMI has played a leadership role in the international conferences concerned with climate change.  As a country that suffered 12 years of devastating U.S. nuclear testing, it has also chosen to take action to assure that the no other country suffers the fate its citizens have due to nuclear weapons.  It has sued the nine nuclear-armed countries for failing to meet their obligations under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and customary international law to negotiate in good faith for an end to the nuclear arms race and for nuclear disarmament.

    marshall_islands_flagThe RMI is a bold, courageous country.  It may be small, but its leaders are not intimidated by the most powerful countries in the world.  It speaks truth to power and it is tackling two of the most critical survival issues of our time.  It is acting for its own survival, but also for the future of humanity and other forms of complex life on the planet.

    In a July 12, 2014 article in the Guardian, “Why the next climate treaty is vital for my country to survive,” RMI Foreign Minister Tony de Brum wrote, “As I said to the big emitters meeting in Paris, the agreement we sign here next year must be nothing less than an agreement to save my country, and an agreement to save the world.”

    In an interview published on the Huffington Post on May 30, 2014, de Brum was asked about what effects the lawsuits against the nine nuclear-armed countries would have on the discourse of nuclear disarmament worldwide.  He replied, “It should stimulate intelligent discourse and wise solutions.  For what would it gain the world for instance, to be protected from climate change, only to suffer massive destruction from nuclear weapons?  All our efforts to be sane about the future must be connected to survival and peace.  The right hand cannot be out seeking climate peace while the left is busy waging nuclear war.”

    How are we to regard the bold actions of this small country?  One way they have been viewed is as quixotic, tilting at windmills.  But this misses the point.  They are doing what they can to save the world.  They are saying, in effect, that power does not have special prerogatives, particularly when the survival of their islands and of all humanity is at stake.  They are modelling by their behavior that we all have a stake in these survival issues.  If they can speak up, so can we, and the more of us who do speak up, the more likely we will save our planet and ourselves.

    I like to think of the lawsuits brought by the Marshall Islands as David pitted against the nine nuclear Goliaths, with the exception that the Marshalls have substituted the courts and the law for a slingshot.  Their action is nonviolent, seeking a judicial order to require the nuclear-armed countries to cease modernizing their nuclear arsenals and to begin negotiating for complete nuclear disarmament.

    Another way to think about the Marshall Islands is as “The Mouse that Roared.”  The RMI is small, but mighty.  In the classic Peter Sellers’ movie, a small, fictional country sets out to lose a war against the United States in order to obtain reparations and save itself from bankruptcy.  In the case of the Marshall Islands, they hope to win the battle, not for reparations, but for human survival on both the climate change and nuclear abolition fronts.

    Finally, it is worth observing that the Marshall Islands is not acting with malice toward the countries that it challenges on climate change or toward those it is suing for failing to meet their legal and moral obligations for nuclear disarmament.   In this sense, it is following the old saying, “Friends do not let friends drive drunk.”  The big, powerful countries have been driving drunk for too long.  The safety of their citizens is also at stake, as is the safety of every inhabitant of the planet, now and in the future.

    The Marshall Islands has given humanity a wake-up call. Each of us has a choice.  We can wake up, or we can continue our complacent slumber.  If you would like to be a hero for nuclear zero, you can support the Marshall Islands at www.nuclearzero.org.

  • U.S. Moves to Dismiss Marshall Islands Lawsuit

    For Immediate Release

    Contact:
    Rick Wayman
    (805) 965-3443 or (805) 696-5159
    rwayman@napf.org

    U.S. Moves to Dismiss Marshall Islands Lawsuit

    On July 21, 2014, the United States filed a motion to dismiss the Nuclear Zero lawsuit that was filed by the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) on April 24, 2014 in U.S. Federal Court.

    The tiny Pacific nation of the Marshall Islands filed a lawsuit against the United States, claiming that the U.S. has breached its obligations under Article VI of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) by continuing to modernize its nuclear arsenal and by failing to pursue negotiations in good faith on nuclear disarmament. The RMI requested that the Court declare the United States in breach of its Treaty obligations and order the U.S. to call for and convene, within one year from the Court’s judgment, negotiations on nuclear disarmament.

    The RMI was used as the testing ground for 67 nuclear tests conducted by the United States from 1946 to 1958. These tests resulted in lasting health and environmental problems for the Marshall Islanders. The RMI lawsuit against the U.S. seeks no compensation, but rather, seeks to end the nuclear weapons threat, not only for itself, but for all humanity, now and in the future.

    The U.S., in its move to dismiss the RMI lawsuit, does not argue that the U.S. is in compliance with its NPT disarmament obligations. Instead, it argues in a variety of ways that its non-compliance with these obligations is, essentially, justifiable, and not subject to the court’s jurisdiction.

    Laurie Ashton, lead attorney representing the RMI, states, “The U.S. government assumes, as it must at this stage in the case, that the U.S. is in breach of its promises under the Non-Proliferation Treaty.  Nonetheless, the U.S. government argues that there is no legal remedy for those breaches—either because the breaches cause no harm or because the breaches raise only political issues, or because the Marshall Islands waited too long to complain in court about the breaches.  These disappointing arguments hammer at the very foundation of every treaty to which the U.S. is a party, and the courts should reject them.”

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (NAPF) is a consultant to the Marshall Islands on the legal and moral issues involved in bringing this case. David Krieger, President of NAPF, upon hearing of the motion to dismiss the case by the U.S. responded, “The U.S. government is sending a terrible message to the world – that is, that U.S. courts are an improper venue for resolving disputes with other countries on U.S. treaty obligations. The U.S. is, in effect, saying that whatever breaches it commits are all right if it says so. That is bad for the law, bad for relations among nations, bad for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament – and not only bad, but extremely dangerous for U.S. citizens and all humanity.”

    Krieger continued, “In 2009, President Obama shared his vision for the world, saying, ‘So today, I state clearly and with conviction America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.’ This lawsuit provides the perfect opportunity for President Obama to move his vision forward. Yet, rather than seizing that opportunity, the U.S. government is seeking dismissal without a full and fair hearing on the merits of the case.”

    In similar lawsuits filed in the International Court of Justice, the RMI has sued all nine nuclear-armed countries for breaching their nuclear disarmament obligations. In the case against the U.S., the RMI legal counsel has one month to respond to the U.S. government’s motion to dismiss.

    To read the Motion to Dismiss in its entirety, visit www.wagingpeace.org/documents/motion_to_dismiss.pdf. For the latest updates on the Nuclear Zero lawsuit, visit www.nuclearzero.org.

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    For further information, or if you would like to interview David Krieger, contact Rick Wayman at rwayman@napf.org or call (805) 696-5159.

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation – NAPF’s mission is to educate and advocate for peace and a world free of nuclear weapons and to empower peace leaders.  Founded in 1982, the Foundation is comprised of individuals and organizations worldwide who realize the imperative for peace in the Nuclear Age. The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation is a non-partisan, non-profit organization with consultative status to the United Nations.  For more information, visit www.wagingpeace.org.

  • U.S. Motion to Dismiss: Above the Law?

    Nuclear Zero LawsuitsOn July 21, 2014, the United States of America filed a Motion to Dismiss in the lawsuit filed by the Republic of the Marshall Islands in U.S. Federal District Court. The U.S. makes many outrageous claims as to why this lawsuit should be dismissed. Taken individually or as a whole, these arguments are extremely concerning.

    The U.S. does not argue that it is in fact in compliance with Article VI of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (the basis of the lawsuit). Instead, it argues that there is nothing that any country can do in a U.S. court of law about its non-compliance. In the motion, the U.S. seeks to avoid the Court getting to the merits of the case by challenging the lawsuit on five different grounds:

     

    1. Plaintiff does not have standing
    2. Political Question Doctrine
    3. The NPT is not self-executing
    4. Venue is improper
    5. Statute of limitations

    A response from the Republic of the Marshall Islands is due by August 21, 2014, and the U.S. reply is then due by September 8, 2014. An initial hearing is currently scheduled in Oakland, California, for September 12, 2014.

    Below are some selected quotes (in italics) from the government’s Motion to Dismiss, followed by my comments.

    From the Introduction

    If Plaintiff believes the United States has breached its treaty obligations, it may pursue the issue as a matter of foreign relations, rather than trying to manufacture a cause of action in federal court.

    This is exactly what many non-nuclear weapon states, including the Marshall Islands, have sought to achieve during the 44 years that the NPT has been in force. The U.S. has actively boycotted numerous recent attempts by nations to address the issue as a matter of foreign relations, including the Open-Ended Working Group (2013) and the conferences on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons in Norway (2013) and Mexico (2014). Additionally, the U.S. sent a low-level representative to the UN High-Level Meeting on nuclear disarmament on September 26, 2013, while conducting a test launch of a Minuteman III Intercontinental Ballistic Missile – the U.S.’s land-based nuclear missile – on that date.

    Argument 1: Plaintiff does not have standing

    Such generalized and speculative fear of the potential danger of nuclear proliferation does not constitute a concrete injury required to establish injury in fact.

    So in the case of nuclear weapons, what exactly would constitute a concrete injury? Death from a nuclear explosion or the ensuing radioactive fallout?

    The United States is not the only State with nuclear weapons, and the United States alone cannot therefore be identified as the source of the plaintiff’s purported injury.

    The Marshall Islands specifically chose to file lawsuits against all nine countries that possess nuclear weapons (United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, China, Israel, India, Pakistan, North Korea) because, in the eyes of RMI, all nine nations are guilty of violating international law. Obviously RMI could not sue the other eight nations in U.S. court; accordingly, they filed nine applications at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Unfortunately, the U.S. and five other nuclear-armed nations do not accept the compulsory jurisdiction of the ICJ and may elect to avoid the lawsuits in that venue. The United Kingdom, India and Pakistan are the only nuclear-armed countries that accept compulsory jurisdiction to the ICJ.

    Moreover, it is entirely speculative whether, should this Court declare the United States in breach of its Article VI obligations and order the United States to call for and convene negotiations for nuclear disarmament, any other nuclear weapon state would agree to participate in such negotiations, let alone whether such a conference would lead to the cessation of the nuclear race or nuclear disarmament.

    The U.S. lawsuit specifically does not attempt to dictate the terms or outcomes of any negotiations – it simply wants negotiations to occur.

    Whatever the nature of that benefit, this Court could not provide relief that would remedy that alleged harm because such a remedy necessarily depends on the actions of other State Parties to the Treaty not before this Court.

    To repeat my previous point, the lawsuit seeks the commencement of negotiations. If other State Parties refuse to come to the table or do not negotiate in good faith, that is an issue that will need to be addressed. What is stopping the United States from attempting in good faith to convene such negotiations?

    Argument 2: Political Question Doctrine

    As an initial matter, an order of this Court declaring the United States in violation of its international Treaty obligations would squarely contradict, and interfere with, the position of the United States that it is “in compliance with all its obligations under arms control, nonproliferation, and disarmament agreements and commitments.”

    That’s the point of the lawsuit. Just because you say something (the U.S. is “in compliance”) doesn’t mean that it is true. There is clear controversy here, and the case should receive a full and fair hearing in the Court.

    Even if this Court deemed it proper to decide whether the United States is in breach of its international obligations, it would have no standards by which it could determine, inter alia, the framework for future negotiations, or decide whether future negotiations would be sufficient.

    This lawsuit does not seek those things. It seeks commencement of negotiations in good faith.

    Indeed, this Court’s involvement in the NPT regime and multilateral disarmament negotiations could have myriad unanticipated consequences. For example, the arbitrary “one year” timeframe sought by plaintiff or the absence of nations not before this Court would present entirely new variables to confront in negotiations.

    The lawsuit seeks a declaration that the U.S. must convene negotiations in good faith within one year. That is not arbitrary. Article VI of the NPT calls for negotiations “at an early date.” The NPT entered into force in 1970. Forty-four years (or 45 or 46 years by the time a judgment is rendered) is much longer than an early date.

    Argument 3: The NPT is not self-executing

    Such language does not suggest that Article VI was intended to be enforced in federal courts. Indeed, Article VI “is… silent as to any enforcement mechanism” in the event of non-compliance.

    If the U.S. would comply with Article VI, there would not be any need to seek an enforcement mechanism. Even if the treaty is “silent” about an enforcement mechanism, it doesn’t mean that there should not be one if a party is blatantly in violation.

    Because the issue of judicial enforcement of Article VI of the NPT was not a central feature of the ratification debate, the record lacks any indication that Article VI was intended to be enforceable in domestic courts.

    Perhaps those debating ratification in the U.S. Senate in the late 1960s did not envision that, 44 years after the treaty entered into force, not even a glimmer of good faith negotiations would have taken place.

    The “infraction becomes the subject of international negotiations and reclamations… It is obvious that with all this the judicial courts have nothing to do and can give no redress.”

    Part of the case against the U.S. in this lawsuit is that it has refused to participate in multilateral forums such as the Open-Ended Working Group. Without a willingness to participate in good faith in international negotiations, what other option does an aggrieved party have than to bring the matter to the Court?

    Argument 4: Venue is improper

    However, it is unclear how that fact [that the National Nuclear Security Administration has a “nuclear weapons lab” in this district] bears anything more than a tangential relationship to this case when plaintiff’s claims are based on an alleged failure to conduct international negotiations, and plaintiff states expressly that it “is not requesting that the U.S. be compelled toward unilateral disarmament.”

    Since its founding in 1952, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has been deeply involved in research, design and testing of U.S. nuclear weapons. Today, nearly 90% of the annual budget of Livermore Lab is dedicated to nuclear weapons design, development, testing and maintenance. By continuing to fund the Livermore Lab at this rate, the U.S. is demonstrating a distinct lack of good faith in working to end the nuclear arms race and achieve nuclear disarmament.

    Argument 5: Statute of limitations

    However, the alleged “continuation” of the purported wrong does not entitle plaintiff to delay unreasonably in pursuit of a legal remedy.

    The U.S. has had 44 years since the NPT entered into force to pursue fulfillment of its Article VI obligations. Instead of fulfilling its obligations, the U.S. continues to engage in Life Extension Programs to modernize its remaining nuclear arsenal and add new military capabilities to some of its nuclear weapons. The U.S. and the other four permanent members of the UN Security Council (Russia, United Kingdom, France, China) have spent years working on a glossary of terms to talk about nuclear weapon issues. It is still not finished. That’s what I call an unreasonable delay. There are no negotiations on the horizon among the “Nuclear Nine” without this legal action.

    Here, the issuance of declaratory (and associated injunctive) relief would be contrary to the public interest, as it would risk interfering with the efforts of the Executive Branch in the foreign and military arenas, where discussions regarding the appropriate steps in support of nuclear disarmament are ongoing. Indeed the next review conference on the NPT is scheduled for 2015 at the United Nations in New York, and, as always, the matter of efforts under Article VI will be subject of discussion among the multitude of State Parties.

    The U.S. appears to be quite happy with the snail’s pace of NPT Review Conferences. To state that it is contrary to the public interest to negotiate in good faith for an end to the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament is shocking, shameful and nonsensical. There are no efforts by the Executive Branch to comply with Article VI of the NPT. The “appropriate steps in support of nuclear disarmament” are clearly spelled out in Article VI itself: negotiate. If you’re not convening a meeting, if you’re not sitting around a table talking about how to get to the end goal in a reasonable timeframe, your efforts are insufficient.

    Plaintiff should not now be permitted to raise its claims in disruption of the diplomatic context that has prevailed for a generation.

    I don’t think any comment is needed on this point. The U.S. government makes it clear how they feel about the status quo around nuclear weapons.

    Further Reading

    To read the initial complaint filed by the Republic of the Marshall Islands against the United States on April 24, 2014, click here.

    To read the U.S. Motion to Dismiss filed on July 21, 2014, click here.

  • U.S. Conference of Mayors Calls for Nuclear Disarmament

    US Conference of Mayors logoThe U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM), the non-partisan association of America’s big cities, on June 23, 2014 unanimously adopted a sweeping new resolution Calling for Constructive Good Faith U.S. Participation in International Nuclear Disarmament Forums at its 82nd annual meeting in Dallas, Texas. According to USCM President Kevin Johnson, Mayor of Sacramento, California, “These resolutions, once adopted, become official USCM policy.”

    Recalling that “August 6 and 9, 2015 will mark the 70th anniversaries of the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which killed more that 210,000 people by the end of 1945,” the resolution notes that “the people of the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) continue to suffer from the health and environmental impacts of 67 above-ground nuclear weapons test explosions conducted by the U.S. in their islands between 1946 and 1958, the equivalent of 1.6 Hiroshima-sized bombs detonated daily for 12 years.”

    On April 24, 2014, the RMI filed “landmark” cases in the International Court of Justice against the U.S. and the eight other nuclear-armed nations, claiming that they have failed to comply with their obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and customary international law to pursue negotiations for the global elimination of nuclear weapons, and filed a companion case in U.S. Federal District Court. In its resolution, the USCM “commends the Republic of the Marshall Islands for calling to the world’s attention the failure of the nine nuclear-armed states to comply with their international obligations to pursue negotiations for the worldwide elimination of nuclear weapons, and calls on the U.S. to respond constructively and in good faith to the lawsuits brought by the RMI.”

    Upon hearing news of the USCM resolution, RMI foreign minister Tony de Brum stated, “We appreciate very much the US Conference of Mayors supporting our modest efforts to rid the world of nuclear weapons.  This endorsement is acknowledged with deep gratitude on behalf of the Government and the People of the Marshall Islands, and most especially those who have lost loved ones in the mad race for nuclear superiority, and those who continue to suffer the scourge of nuclear weapons testing in our homeland.”

    Over the past three years there has been a new round of nuclear disarmament initiatives by governments not possessing nuclear weapons, both within and outside the United Nations. Yet the U.S. has been notably “missing in action” at best, and dismissive or obstructive at worst. The USCM resolution documents the dismal U.S. record and calls on the administration to participate constructively in deliberations and negotiations regarding the creation of a multilateral process to achieve a nuclear weapons free world in forums including the Third Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons to be held in Vienna, Austria in December 2014, the UN Conference on Disarmament, and the May 2015 NPT Review Conference.

    The USCM also “calls on the President and Congress to reduce nuclear weapons spending to the minimum necessary to assure the safety and security of the existing weapons as they await disablement and dismantlement, and to redirect those funds to meet the urgent needs of cities.”

    Recalling the U.S. commitment under the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) to pursue negotiations in good faith on the elimination of nuclear weapons, the resolution notes that “forty-four years after the NPT entered into force, an estimated 16,400 nuclear weapons, most held by the U.S. and Russia, pose an intolerable threat to humanity, and there are no disarmament negotiations on the horizon” and that “the U.S. and the eight other nuclear weapon possessing states are investing an estimated $100 billion annually to maintain and modernize their nuclear arsenals while actively planning to deploy nuclear weapons for the foreseeable future.”

    The resolution states that “according to the General Accounting Office, the U.S. will spend more than $700 billion over the next 30 years to maintain and modernize nuclear weapons systems,” and that “this money is desperately needed to address basic human needs such as housing, food security, education, healthcare, public safety, education and environmental protection.”

    Reflecting current international tensions, the resolution warns that “the U.S.- Russian conflict over the Ukraine may lead to a new era of confrontation between nuclear-armed powers, and nuclear tensions in the Middle East, Southeast Asia and on the Korean peninsula remind us that the potential for nuclear war is ever present.” The resolution “urges President Obama to engage in intensive diplomatic efforts to reverse the deteriorating U.S. relationship with Russia.”

    Expressing its “deep concern” about the U.S. failure to engage in recent intergovernmental and United Nations nuclear disarmament initiatives, the USCM “calls on the U.S. to participate constructively and in good faith in the Third Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons to be hosted by Austria in Vienna, December 8 – 9, 2014” and “in urgent commencement of negotiations in the Conference on Disarmament for the early conclusion of a comprehensive convention on nuclear weapons,” and “to press the other nuclear weapon states to do likewise.”

    The USCM “calls on the U.S. to demonstrate a good faith commitment to its disarmament obligation under Article VI of the NPT by commencing a process to negotiate the global elimination of nuclear weapons within a timebound framework, under strict and effective international control, at the May 2015 NPT Review Conference, and to press the other nuclear weapon states to do likewise.”

    The USCM also “calls on its membership to Proclaim September 26 in their cities as the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons and to support activities to enhance public awareness and education about the threat posed to humanity by nuclear weapons and the necessity for their total elimination.”

    The resolution notes that Mayors for Peace, with over 6,000 members in 158 countries, representing one seventh of the world’s population, continues to advocate for the immediate commencement of negotiations to eliminate nuclear weapons by 2020, and that “Mayors for Peace, with members in the U.S. and Russia; India and Pakistan, and Israel, Palestine and Iran can be a real force for peace.” The USCM “expresses its continuing support for and cooperation with Mayors for Peace,” and “encourages all U.S. mayors for join Mayors for Peace.”

    The resolution was sponsored by Mayor Donald Plusquellic of Akron, Ohio, past President of the USCM and a Vice-President of Mayors for Peace, and 26 co-sponsoring mayors from cities in Virginia, North Carolina, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Oregon, Florida, Massachusetts, Arkansas, Wisconsin, Illinois, Maine, California, Minnesota, and New Mexico.

    Mayors for Peace is an international association, founded in 1982 by the Mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The United States Conference of Mayors is the national non-partisan association of cities with populations over 30,000.

    Full text of the resolution, with the complete list of co-sponsors: http://wslfweb.org/docs/MSPUSCMsponsorsfinal.pdf

    Official link (does not include list of co-sponsors): http://www.usmayors.org/resolutions/82nd_Conference/international08.asp

    More information about Mayors for Peace: www.mayorsforpeace.org and www.2020visioncampaign.org

    More information about the U.S. Conference of Mayors: www.usmayors.org

  • Pressure on the Nuclear Nine

    This letter to the editor was published in The New York Times on July 15, 2014.

    To the Editor:

    Re “India’s Role in the Nuclear Race” (editorial, July 6):

    New York Times logoWhile India tries to squeeze into the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the world’s nine nuclear-armed countries — including India — are being sued by the Marshall Islands in the International Court of Justice for their continuing possession and modernization of nuclear weapons. The lawsuits allege that India and the others are in continuous violation of customary international law by failing to negotiate in good faith for nuclear disarmament.

    As the International Court of Justice unanimously declared in 1996, “There exists an obligation to pursue in good faith and bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament in all its aspects under strict and effective international control.”

    Your suggestion that India negotiate with Pakistan and China for an end to that region’s nuclear arms race would be a good start to fulfilling its existing international legal obligations. But good-faith negotiations must also go beyond India’s immediate rivals to include all nine nuclear-armed countries.

    India’s pursuit of Nuclear Suppliers Group membership is not merely a question of trade and commerce. It is a question of whether known nuclear proliferators will be rewarded or held accountable under international law.

    RICK WAYMAN
    Director of Programs
    Nuclear Age Peace Foundation
    Santa Barbara, Calif.

  • World Council of Churches Statement Towards a Nuclear-Free World

    The 10th Assembly of the World Council of Churches met in a region where nuclear explosions, accidents and threats have taken a heavy toll. Northeast Asia is the only place on earth where nuclear weapons have been used in warfare. During the Cold War more than 1,000 nuclear bombs were tested in adjoining areas of the Pacific and Asia. Today all states in the region either possess nuclear weapons or depend on the US nuclear arsenal. The 100-plus nuclear power plants in East Asia and the many more planned are signs of economic prowess but also reminders of the Fukushima tragedy. South Korea has the highest geographic concentration of nuclear power plants in the world.

    Living in proximity to nuclear power plants and in the target zones of opposing nuclear forces, people of conscience and courage in Northeast Asia are raising serious questions about the military and economic path of their societies. Before and after the Busan Assembly, ecumenical and inter-religious conferences in Japan, Korea, USA and Europe have called variously for replacing nuclear power in the region as a step toward sustainable development, and eliminating nuclear weapons as a step toward peace.[i]

    Nuclear weapons cannot indeed be reconciled with real peace. They inflict unspeakable suffering with blast, heat and radiation. They wreak destruction which cannot be bound by space or time. Their power is indiscriminate and their effects cannot be matched by any other device. As long as nuclear weapons exist, they pose a threat to humanity.

    Cities are the main targets of nuclear weapons. Attacking cities with 100 small, Hiroshima-size bombs would kill some 20 million people outright and cause two or three times that number of casualties over time. Soot from the incinerated cities would be lofted into the upper atmosphere, disrupting the global climate. For a decade, colder temperatures and shorter growing seasons would put two billion people at risk of starvation.[ii]

    In the face of such data, 124 governments declared in 2013 that “It is in the interest of the very survival of humanity that nuclear weapons are never used again, under any circumstances.”[iii] Nuclear strategy, however, demands an unequivocal commitment to use the weapons and nuclear history is rife with accidents, miscalculations and near-disasters.[iv] What is more, even one nuclear detonation would overwhelm the emergency services of any country in the world.[v] The only way to ensure that nuclear weapons are never used again is to eliminate the weapons themselves.

    The related technology of nuclear energy is a peculiarly hazardous form of development. The Fukushima Daiichi disaster in 2011 has demonstrated once more the threats it poses to people, community life and natural ecosystems. Tens of thousands of the people displaced by the disaster will never be allowed to go home. Their farms, villages and cities stand empty, contaminated. The disaster’s full impact on public health and the environment will never be known. A complete clean-up is impossible.

    Victims of Fukushima are now referred to as hibakusha, a term that connotes suffering, social stigma and an unnatural fate. The term was first used to describe people struck by the atomic bombings in Japan.

    2015 is the 70th anniversary of those bombings. The hibakusha of 1945 still bear witness in the hope that no one else will ever suffer their fate. They are now joined by the hibakusha of 2011 who decry nuclear power. It is right that Christians and churches listen to them and make their witness our own.

    Health, humanitarian and environmental concerns

    Military and civilian uses of nuclear technology both produce large quantities of poisonous materials that do not exist in nature and are among the world’s worst forms of environmental contamination. Some of the by-products pose a threat to living things for millions of years.[vi] No known options for long-term storage or disposal of nuclear waste are capable of isolating nuclear waste from the environ­ment for the timeframe of its inherent hazards.[vii]

    By fuelling our economies with nuclear power and protecting ourselves with nuclear weapons, we are poisoning the earth and generating risks for ourselves, our descendants and other living things.

    Nuclear radiation is a poison that cannot be seen, smelled or tasted. Its health effects are severe and multi-generational. Isotopes released by nuclear power plants may contaminate the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food we eat. They are radioactively and chemically toxic to the human body.

    The effects of ionizing radiation are observable early in a nuclear disaster in the psychological and social traumas that tear at families and communities. With time, increased risks of a variety of cancers also emerge and permanent genetic damage becomes apparent.

    The use of the term “safe” for the nuclear industry has proven to be unsupportable. Serious accidents that were judged to be highly unlikely have occurred repeatedly.[viii] The grave consequences of such accidents have been routinely ignored or dismissed by the governments and corporations involved.

    Setting “acceptable” levels for exposure to the ionizing radiation and chemical toxins released during nuclear accidents and nuclear tests has proved to be misleading and dangerous. After Chernobyl, Fukushima and other accidents, the “acceptable” level of contamination was simply raised in order to minimize the perceived seriousness of the event and to deflect public criticism.

    Similar policies prevail around nuclear test sites. Local inhabitants were routinely told by the foreigners using their land that they had nothing to fear from radioactive fallout. Sometimes they were not even told to leave high-risk areas. In many reported cases, military doctors sent to study the effects of radiation were authorized to examine the test victims but not to provide medical care. The adverse impact of nuclear substances on communities around nuclear test sites continues to this day.[ix]

    In recent decades, new humanitarian norms have been built against chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction, laser weapons, landmines and cluster munitions. The show of resolve by leading nuclear powers to eradicate Syria’s chemical weapons is both a case in point and a precedent for further action.

    Achieving a similar, humanitarian ban on the world’s most powerful weapon will be difficult. Nuclear-armed states appear to be flouting majority concerns by emphasizing the continued importance of nuclear weapons, modernizing their arsenals for many more decades of use and minimizing the Non-Proliferation Treaty obligation to negotiate effective measures for nuclear disarmament. Nevertheless, a new global constituency for abolition is transforming nuclear debate. Governments, international organizations, civil society campaigns and religious networks are delegiti­mizing nuclear weapons on the basis of their health, humanitarian and environmental consequences. The legitimacy and prestige ascribed to nuclear weapons is eroding as a result.

    Ecumenical discernment in nuclear affairs

    The World Council of Churches has consistently emphasized the need to engage in ethical reflection and advocacy on nuclear weapons and nuclear energy from the standpoint of justice, participation and sustainabil­ity. The WCC First Assembly in 1948 declared war with “atomic” and other modern weapons “a sin against God and a degradation of man”. Church policies have addressed nuclear dangers ever since.

    The Fifth Assembly in 1975 warned of “ethical dilemmas” raised by nuclear power generation and nuclear weapons, the hazards of waste storage, and the spread of nuclear technology.[x] The 1979 World Conference on Faith, Science and the Future also warned that nuclear power could not play a significant long-term role in reducing CO2 emissions, called for a moratorium on nuclear power plant construction and urged a major shift towards renewable energy.[xi]

    The Sixth Assembly in 1983 called for “an international legal instrument that would outlaw as a crime against humanity the possession as well as the use of nuclear arms”. Ecumenical concerns three years later during the Chernobyl disaster may be read forward into the Fukushima crisis today: the safety of nuclear workers; the pattern of official silence about well-founded risks; and the denial of citizens’ right to information about personal harm.

    The WCC Consultation on Nuclear Energy in 1989 noted that “Human actions often violate the integrity of creation and today endanger its very survival,” and recommended three ethical principles for energy technologies which are valid in assessing nuclear energy today: (a) the responsibility to future generations to promote the “sustainability of creation”, (b) justice as enabling human survival and fulfilment; and (c) participation of people in energy choices which directly affect their lives.”[xii]

    The 2009 WCC Statement on Eco-justice and Ecological Debt addresses concerns relevant to both military and civilian uses of nuclear energy: the concept of “ecological debt” which applies to populations affected by the manufacture, testing and deployment of nuclear weapons and by the “nuclear winter” and famine which a nuclear conflict may cause; the “era of unlimited consumption” which is fuelled in part by nuclear energy; and economic and ecological findings which deny claims that nuclear power is safe, cheap and reliable.

    The 2011 International Ecumenical Peace Convocation in Jamaica reaffirmed the WCC call for “total nuclear disarmament”. It declared that the Fukushima disaster of 2011 “has proven once again that we must no longer rely on nuclear power as a source of energy.”

    The 2013 WCC Assembly in South Korea said that “shared human security must become a greater priority on the Korean peninsula than divisive, competitive and militarized security” and called for the elimination of nuclear power plants and nuclear weapons in North East Asia.[xiii]

    Ecumenical advocacy against nuclear dangers is shaped by the worldwide engagement of member churches. From Canada to India, from Japan to Australia, from Germany to the Marshall Islands, churches resist the construction of nuclear power stations, protest against the presence of nuclear weapons and support communities affected by uranium mining, nuclear tests and nuclear disasters. In many of these struggles, there is cooperation with people of other faiths.

    The WCC central committee recognizes that there are churches still journeying with the difficult subject of nuclear energy and acknowledges that there are churches who will have a different process, depending on their context, for addressing the issue of nuclear energy.

    Church leaders in three African countries were catalysts in bringing the African Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone into effect in 2009, fulfilling a WCC Assembly recommendation in 2006. An ecumenical advocacy network convened by the WCC helped to ensure that the Arms Trade Treaty of 2013 has humanitarian and human rights criteria, pursuant to a WCC central committee decision in 2011. In keeping with a recommendation from Busan, churches on six continents are engaged in coordinated ecumenical advocacy towards a humanitarian ban on nuclear weapons.

    Stewardship of creation and management of risks

    Christians are called to share in the responsibility to safeguard God’s creation and protect the sanctity of life. Responsible and inclusive stewardship of energy today must take greater account of the common good, the integrity of creation and humanity’s future. Energy sources must be safe, efficient and renewable. Energy conservation must be an integral part of energy use. Present uses must not create serious problems for the future. Today’s energy must be suitable, in effect, to serve as tomorrow’s energy as well.

    Despite decades of scrutiny, nuclear energy has not met such requirements. It is not renewable and not based on a sustainable resource. Carbon is emitted throughout the nuclear fuel chain – from mining, processing, transportation, construction and operations to decommissioning and the perpetual manage­ment of toxic nuclear waste. Claims that nuclear energy is clean and environmentally-friendly appear to ignore its overall impact, its consequences and its alternatives.

    Nuclear energy has also proved to be unaffordable, particularly when government subsidies and the transfer of liability to citizens are included, and the incalculable costs of long-term nuclear waste management are acknowledged. A full reckoning of affordability must also include both direct and indirect subsidies, liabilities in case of disaster, and safe decommissioning. Some of these costs are hidden; some continue indefinitely. Compared to other energy sources, nuclear plants also require heavy capital investment.[xiv] Large governmental subsidies for nuclear power typically far surpass government support for renewable energy technologies.[xv]

    Large expenditures of public funds are also a conspicuous feature of nuclear weapons programs. Each year nuclear-armed states spend about $100 billion on their nuclear forces. Current plans for weapons upgrades, renewals and extensions total $500 billion or more in the Euro-Atlantic region alone. These public billions are a vast source of revenue for private enterprises including corporations also involved in nuclear energy. About 300 banks, financial institutions and pension funds in 30 countries invest in 27 corporations with nuclear weapons-related contracts. Their holdings in 2013 totalled $314 billion.[xvi]

    Nuclear energy use is laden with risks which are difficult to manage. The probability of a nuclear disaster may be relatively low but the consequences of a disaster range from very high to unthinkable. The risk, therefore, is high.

    Many governments have made the responsible decision to avoid such risks entirely. Following the Fukushima disaster, Japan, Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Mexico and Taiwan shut down, stopped building or pledged to eventually phase-out nuclear power plants. Other states renewed their resolve to rely on non-nuclear energy sources and to reject nuclear armaments.

    Governments that subsidize nuclear power plants are simultaneously accepting risks and exposing their publics to those risks. They use public monies to subsidize an industry which private capital shuns because of its inherent risks. In addition to multi-billion-dollar subsidies, governments grant the industry exemptions from liability in case of a nuclear accident or disaster. The total economic loss from the Fukushima disaster, for example, is estimated to be US$250-500 billion.[xvii]

    To deploy nuclear weapons is to embrace what is arguably the greatest intentional risk in human history. First, the government involved must maintain a credible threat to use its weapons. Second, it must rely on its enemies’ risk management to avoid being attacked. Third, it must stand ready to abandon its own risk management if attacked. Its adversaries embrace the same contradictions. The fate of the earth has hung by the thread of this bizarre gamble for a lifetime. Surely, to persist in such a gamble makes a mockery of our Creator.

    In spite of treaties and agreements, the proliferation of nuclear weapons remains a continuous risk. While the number of nuclear warheads has been reduced since the Cold War, the overall trend among nuclear-armed states is to modernize rather than eliminate their nuclear arsenals. Also, the number of countries with nuclear weapons capability has increased. In fact, simply having a nuclear weapons program has proved to be a powerful tool in international affairs, even for a small country.

    Security and opportunity links between nuclear power and nuclear weapons

    Nuclear power is the pathway to acquiring the equipment, materials and technology necessary for the manufacture of nuclear weapons. Promoted as “atoms for peace” and “peaceful uses of nuclear energy”, the expansion of nuclear power has facilitated the spread of nuclear weapons. The civilian use of nuclear power can hide military intentions and tempt countries to reprocess plutonium from nuclear waste for use in nuclear weapons. Countries with different levels of technical sophistication can use reactor-grade plutonium for nuclear warheads.

    Civilian and military nuclear facilities are potential targets for acts of terrorism or war. Radioactive material may be stolen or sold, and used with conventional explosives to make a ‘dirty’ bomb.

    Since more than 400 nuclear power plants are in operation worldwide and 15 countries rely on them for a quarter of their electricity or more, it will take time to replace nuclear power. However, cheaper, safer and more sustainable alternatives are available. The first is conservation. It is estimated that a quarter of all current energy production could be saved through conservation measures – far more than the amount now generated by nuclear power. Energy savings are the most accessible, the least expensive, and the safest alternative to nuclear energy.

    Phasing out nuclear reactors and eliminating nuclear arsenals will present other opportunities as well – to expand renewable energy, to support communities where nuclear-related jobs are lost, to promote new, environmentally responsible businesses, to cease production of dangerous nuclear substances, and to remove nuclear threats from international relations. It would also offer the opportunity – like the climate crisis – to demonstrate that good governance and human flourishing in the 21st century require a coherent realignment of national and international self-interest.

    Nuclear exodus as pilgrimage of justice and peace

    God is a generous Creator, calling life into being from atoms and molecules and endowing creation with life in abundance. To split the atom into deadly, unnatural elements already gives cause for serious ethical and theological reflection. To use the energy of the atom in ways that threaten and destroy life is a sinful misuse of God’s creation.

    We are called to live in ways that protect life instead of putting it at risk – neither living fearfully, defended by nuclear weapons, nor living wastefully, dependent on nuclear energy. We are invited to build communities and economies in harmony with God’s manifold gifts and promises of life.

    In the 1990s, when the Sahtu-Dene people of northern Canada learned that uranium from their lands had been used in the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, they sent a delegation of elders to Japan to apologize. We too have such a witness: to judge armaments and energy use by their effects on people and on God’s creation; to confess that our desire for material comfort and convenience insulates us from concern for the source and quantity of the energy we consume; to abandon all support for retaining nuclear weapons and refuse to accept that the mass destruction of other peoples can be a legitimate form of protection for ourselves.

    The voices of the hibakusha, pi-pok-ja (Korean atomic bomb sufferers) and test site victims cry out for an exodus from the nuclear age. We must listen to all who suffer nuclear harm – those whose bodies are deformed by genetic mutations, whose lands and seas are poisoned by nuclear tests, whose farms and cities are fouled by nuclear accidents, whose work in mines and power plants exposes them to radiation.

    God delivers us from evil including nuclear evil. Confronted with the possible destruction of creation, God opened the covenant to include all of creation (Genesis 9). The Spirit of God sustains all creation (Psalm 104). Exploitation of people and destruction of creation go hand in hand (Isaiah 23). God’s word guides us toward the divine presence and purpose in creation, warns us not to interfere with creation’s goodness, and reminds us that all of creation is worthy of wonder, celebration and praise.

    God sets before us life and death, blessings and curses. God implores us, “Now choose life”, so that we and our children may live (Deuteronomy 30). The Busan Assembly was reminded that God’s “now” is imminent, is eschatological time, a time of metanoia and full of grace. As churches we must educate ourselves to choose life by turning from the blinding flash of nuclear warheads and the deadly glow of nuclear reactors to healthy sources of energy in the natural world within which we have our being – sun, wind, water and geo-thermal energy. This is the path of exodus from nuclear and other dangers.

    “We have enjoyed the sweetness of plentiful energy through nuclear energy; now we must learn the bitterness of closing nuclear reactors and dealing with radioactive waste,” said a Korean Christian declaration of faith prior to the Busan Assembly. “We urgently proclaim the need not for the security of the status quo of nuclear-armed states but for the securing of life for all humanity and creation.”[xviii]

    God has prepared a path for us toward life, justice and peace and away from self-destruction, violence and war.[xix] In that spirit the 10th Assembly invited churches worldwide to join and strengthen an Ecumenical Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace.

    The World Council of Churches central committee, meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, 2-8 July 2014, therefore calls on member churches and related ministries and networks to:

    1. Sustain and deepen ethical and theological discussions about civilian and military uses of nuclear energy, seeking discernment on what purposes they serve, how much they actually cost, whose interests they serve, what rights they violate, their impact on health and the environment, and whether there is a witness inherent in using nuclear electricity or in accepting protection from nuclear arms;
    2. Develop and practice ecologically sensitive spirituality to guide transformative changes in individual and community lifestyles; make positive changes in energy consumption, efficiency, conservation, and the use of energy from renewable sources; and build on the experience of environmentally conscious churches in the WCC;
    3. Practice and promote divestment from businesses and financial institutions involved in the production of nuclear weapons or nuclear power plants and related exports, and advocate for the reallocation of government spending from nuclear weapons and nuclear power plants to the development of renewable energy and the redevelopment of communities where nuclear industries are closing;
    4. Support rehabilitation, pastoral accompaniment, legal action and compensation of losses for the victims of nuclear accidents and nuclear tests including survivors of the Fukushima disaster in Japan and victims of nuclear tests in the Pacific; similarly, support the lawsuit filed by the Marshall Islands against the nuclear-armed states at the International Court of Justice;
    5. Call on their governments to join inter-governmental initiatives, and affirm civil society endeavours, to ban the production, deployment, transfer and use of nuclear weapons in accordance with international humanitarian law and in fulfilment of existing international obligations;
    6. Join ecumenical advocacy networks collaborating with civil society, churches and other religious organizations in open, participatory alliances such as the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN);
    7. Support specific steps towards the long-standing ecumenical goal of denuclearizing the Korean peninsula, including a moratorium on military exercises and the negotiation of collective regional security agreements to replace nuclear deterrence;
    8. Oppose the expansion of military bases, nuclear forces and missile defences in Asia or targeting Asia, and raise aware­ness of public resistance to such military expansion including the new naval base at Gangjeong Village on Jeju Island, Republic of Korea.

    The central committee calls on member churches, related ministries and networks to engage in coordinated national and international advocacy with the WCC to:

    1. Urge the 31 states without nuclear weapons – which call for nuclear disarmament but depend on the nuclear forces of the United States – to actively support the elimination of nuclear weapons in accordance with international humanitarian law, remove all nuclear weapons from their territory and negotiate collective, non-nuclear, security agreements;
    2. Promote new nuclear-weapon-free zones, particularly in Northeast Asia and the Middle East, and steps to strengthen existing zones in Southeast Asia, the Pacific, Latin America and Africa against any presence or threat from nuclear weapons;
    3. Urge governments to phase-out nuclear power plants and reform overall energy use to increase energy efficiency and conservation, reduce carbon emissions and toxic waste, and develop renewable energy resources;
    4. Organize coherent and inter-disciplinary actions consistent with these recommendations as contributions to the Ecumenical Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace.

    _____________

    END NOTES

    [i] Member church and related ecumenical and inter-religious conference statements raising nuclear issues in the lead-up to, and after, the WCC Assembly in Busan:

    • Declaration of the International Conference on the East Japan Disaster, “Resisting the Myth of Safe Nuclear Energy: The Fundamental Question from Fukushima”, United Church of Christ in Japan, Sendai, March 2014.
    • A Call for Peace and Reconciliation on the Korean Peninsula: Ecumenical Korea Peace Statement, United Methodist Church et al, Atlanta, May 2013
    • A Joint Statement on Peace in the Korean Peninsula, Presbyterian Church in Korea-Presbyterian Church USA, Louisville, April 2013
    • Sang-Saeng: Living Together in Justice and Peace, Pre-Assembly Nuclear Advocacy Consultation Working Paper, WCC-ecumenical-interfaith, Seoul, December 2012
    • No to Nuclear Power! Faith Declaration from Fukushima, National Council of Churches in Japan, Fukushima, December 2012
    • Christians for a Nuclear-free Earth, ecumenical statement, Tokyo, May 2012
    • Faith Declaration for a World Free of Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Energy, Korean Network for a World Free of Nuclear Power and Weapons, Seoul, March 2012
    • For a World without Nuclear Power Plants, Anglican Church in Japan, Kyoto, May 2012
    • Asia Inter-Religious Conferences on Article Nine of the Japanese Constitution, three conference statements: Okinawa, 2012; Seoul, 2010; Tokyo, 2008
    • For a World of Peace, a World Free of Nuclear Weapons, ecumenical Korean-international statement, 2010

    [ii] Self-assured destruction: The climate impacts of nuclear war, Alan Robock and Owen Brian, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 2012, http://climate.envsci.rutgers.edu/pdf/RobockToonSAD.pdf

    [iii] Joint Statement on the Humanitarian Consequences of Nuclear Weapons, 68th Session, UN General Assembly, 2013, http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/images/documents/Disarmament-fora/1com/1com13/statements/21Oct_Joint.pdf

    [iv] Command and Control, by Eric Schlosser, Allen Lane, 2013

    [v] Nuclear Famine: Two Billion People at Risk, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, 2013, http://www.ippnw.org/pdf/nuclear-famine-two-billion-at-risk-2013.pdf

    [vi] See background paper, Timeframe of Care, Mary Lou Harley, United Church of Canada

    [vii] Final Study: Choosing a Way Forward, Canadian Nuclear Waste Management Organization, 2005, http://www.nwmo.ca/studyreport

    [viii] International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale. International Atomic Energy Agency, http://www-ns.iaea.org/tech-areas/emergency/ines.asp

    [ix] Report of the Special Rapporteur (Calin Georgescu), Human Rights Council, Geneva, 3 September 2012

    [x] Breaking Barriers, Official Report of the Fifth Assembly, WCC, 1975, p. 128

    [xi] Faith and Science in an Unjust World, Vol. II, WCC, 1979, p. 90

    [xii] Church and Society Working Group Report, World Council of Churches Consultation on Nuclear Energy, Kinshasa, Zaire, 1989

    [xiii] Statement on Peace and Reunification of the Korean Peninsula, 10th Assembly, World Council of Churches, 2013, http://www.oikoumene.org/en/resources/documents/assembly/2013-busan/adopted-documents-statements/peace-and-reunification-of-the-korean-peninsula

    [xiv] For example, in the US, a dollar invested in energy efficiency can deliver five times more electricity than nuclear power. Investments in wind energy can produce 100-times more electricity. Fukushima and the Future of Nuclear Power, Green Cross International, 2011, http://www.gcint.org/sites/default/files/article/files/GCI_ Perspective_Nuclear_Power_20110411.pdf

    [xv] Ibid; in the US, the ratio was ten to one in 2009–$55 billion for nuclear, $5.5 billion for solar and wind energy.

    [xvi] www.dontbankonthebomb.com

    [xvii] Costs and Consequences of Fukushima, Physicians for Social Responsibility, http://www.psr.org/environment-and-health/environmental-health-policy-institute/responses/costs-and-consequences-of-fukushima.html

    [xviii] Faith Declaration for a World Free of Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Energy, Seoul, Republic of Korea, March 2012

    [xix] Exodus to a New Earth, Peace Plenary, WCC 10th Assembly in Ecumenical Review, December 2013, p. 484.