A new international group committed to eliminating nuclear weapons over the next 25 years has enlisted scores of world leaders as its campaign gets under way at a conference in Paris tomorrow.
“The aim is to get to zero,” said Richard Burt, chief strategic weapons negotiator for former president US president George Bush.
Even Iran is considered a potential supporter, he said in an interview.
“If there is growing support by nuclear powers and public opinion worldwide, I think it becomes harder for any government, including Iran, to cross that barrier,” Burt said.
The group, Global Zero, is proposing deep cuts in US and Russian nuclear arsenals, a verification and enforcement system and phased reduction leading to the elimination of all stockpiles.
After the meeting, delegations will go to Moscow for talks with Russian officials on Wednesday and to Washington to see officials from the administration of US President George W. Bush and possibly advisers to president-elect Barack Obama on Thursday.
Ultimately, the planners are hoping to stage a world summit in January 2010.
More than 100 political, military, business, religious and civic leaders have lent their support to the campaign.
Listed supporters include former US president Jimmy Carter; former US secretary of state Lawrence Eagleburger; former US defense secretary Frank Carlucci; and former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
The launching in Paris follows 18 months of consultations.
Global Zero urges US-Russian negotiations to cut back nuclear stockpiles to roughly 1,000 weapons apiece, from current arsenals of about 5,000 warheads each, followed by a second phase bringing in countries such as China, Britain and France.
From there, Burt says, the aim would be to attract would-be members of the nuclear club such as Iran.
“You got to think of this in terms of faith,” Burt said.
Daryl Kimball, director of the private Arms Control Association, said Global Zero’s approach was different from other campaigns in that its thrust is to encourage leaders to meet to discuss and eventually negotiate a timetable for disarmament.
“Most past strategies,” Kimball said, “have focused on a step-by-step approach toward zero, a process that has gone far too slowly.”
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS