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2009 January 21 - 27 [ANTI-N-ARMS]

Anti-nuclear NGOs create liaison council to push ICNND

Japanese anti-nuclear NGOs have formed a liaison council to urge the International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament (ICNND) to reflect the call for the abolition of nuclear weapons in its activities toward the 2010 NPT Review Conference.

The inauguration meeting of the liaison council was held in Tokyo on January 25.

The ICNND, co-chaired by former Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans and former Japanese Foreign Minister Kawaguchi Yoriko, plans to compile a proposal for national governments to follow toward the next NPT Review Conference in 2010 by the end of this year.

Representatives of eight organizations, including the Japan Council against A & H Bombs (Japan Gensuikyo), the Japan Congress against A- and H-Bombs (Japan Gensuikin), and the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations (Nihon Hidankyo), were chosen as board members.

The liaison council plans to call on the ICNND to create a concrete and solid proposal for the world to “steadily proceed toward the abolition of nuclear weapons.”

Its request to the ICNND will include the conclusion of an international treaty to ban nuclear weapons and other frameworks to illegalize nuclear weapons, the reduction of nuclear weapons’ roles in security strategies (breakaway from the “nuclear umbrella” rationale), and establishment of a regional non-nuclear and peace system in Northeast Asia.

The liaison council will send three A-bomb survivors (Hibakusha) to the ICNND’s second meeting in Washington in February to testify on their A-bomb experiences.