Japan Press Weekly

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2025 March 5 - 11 TOP3 [PEACE]

JCP Kasai in New York calls on world’s gov’ts to break free from ‘nuclear deterrence’ theory doctrine

Japanese Communist Party Kasai Akira, a former member of the House of Representatives, on March 5 took part in a session on “universalization” of the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) at the third meeting of TPNW states parties being held at the UN Headquarters in New York.

During the session, representatives of governments and civil society discussed ways to increase the number of TPNW member countries.

Kasai said, “The treaty has been generating broad support and solidarity in civil societies worldwide, even in nuclear-weapons states and countries dependent on the ‘nuclear umbrella’.” He called on the international community to make more efforts to help create a common understanding of the inhumanity of nuclear weapons in cooperation with Hibakusha and victims of nuclear testing.

Regarding the “nuclear deterrence” theory as “another name for the threat to use nuclear weapons”, Kasai warned, “The ‘deterrence’ doctrine does not deter either aggression or war, but it will cause a vicious cycle promoting nuclear arms races which will endanger world peace and security.”

Kasai emphasized the importance of elucidating the nature of the “nuclear deterrence” logic from policy and theoretical perspectives in order to defeat that logic. He also stressed the need to share with the world the reality of the devastating consequences following the use of nuclear weapons.

Kasai proposed that global citizens’ action take place to move forward toward achieving a world without nuclear weapons on August 6 and 9, on the 80th anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and on the occasion of the 11th NPT Review Conference next April.