South Africa: From Nuclear Armed State to Disarmament Hero

By Jamshed Baruah

GENEVA (IDN) – South Africa, the only country that went from developing its own nuclear arsenal to dismantling it and being an outspoken advocate against these weapons of mass destruction, took another critical step towards a nuclear-weapons-free-world: on February 25: it ratified in the halls of the UN Headquarters in New York, the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). [2019-02-28]

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Enhancing Interaction Between CTBT and the Pelindaba Treaty

By CTBTO Preparatory Commission

VIENNA (IDN-INPS) – The CTBTO participated in the Africa Commission on Nuclear Energy (AFCONE) special session held in Algiers from February 12-13, 2019.

Created by the Pelindaba Treaty, establishing Africa as Nuclear Weapons Free Zone (NWFZ) in 2009, AFCONE plays an important role in regional efforts on disarmament and non-proliferation. It also promotes peaceful and scientific benefits of nuclear technology in Africa. [2019-02-27]

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Beyond the Second Trump-Kim Nuclear Weapons Summit

Viewpoint by Jonathan Power

LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – Kim Jong-un, paramount leader of the North Korean dictatorship, arrived in Vietnam by train and limousine ready to meet President Donald Trump. The two leaders met in June 2018 in Singapore, applauded themselves and each other and made some sort of a deal even if it wasn’t the one Trump boasted about – the total elimination of the North’s nuclear weapons. [2019-02-26]

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IAEA Keen to Enhance Nuclear Security in Africa

By Reinhard Jacobsen

VIENNA (IDN) – Enhancing regulatory framework for nuclear security in Africa has been on the agenda of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), nuclear watchdog of the United Nations, for nearly two years.

Against this backdrop, lawyers and nuclear scientists from 10 African countries reviewed the status of their countries’ regulatory frameworks for the security of radioactive material and developed action plans to address any identified gaps during the IAEA’s first School on Drafting Nuclear Security Regulations for African Countries. [2019-02-25]

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UN Warns Against Emerging Hypersonic Weapon Technologies

By J Nastranis

NEW YORK (IDN) – Emerging hypersonic weapon technologies present a challenge for the existing arms control and disarmament architecture at a time when it is already under strain. Because hypersonic weapons do not count towards the limits of the New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty), which is the key arms control agreement limiting the strategic delivery systems of the two major nuclear powers, Russia and the United States, warns a new study. Nevertheless, several States are actively pursuing novel long-range manoeuvrable weapons, most significantly hypersonic boost-glide systems comprising ballistic missiles equipped with hypersonic glide vehicles (HGVs). [2019-02-24]

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On the Precipice of a Multipolar Qualitative Nuclear Arms Race

Viewpoint by Izumi Nakamitsu

Following are extensive excerpts from a video briefing by Izumi Nakamitsu, the United Nations High Representative for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA), to the 65-nation Conference on Disarmament in Geneva on 7 February 2019.

NEW YORK | GENEVA (IDN-INPS) – 2019 will be a weighty year for the Conference on Disarmament. As a global community we are beset by challenges. In the field of disarmament our progress has slowed to a crawl and is in imminent danger of suffering reversals. Instead of seeking to enhance what binds us, we tend to focus on what divides us. [2019-02-23]

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Experts Discuss Prospects Of Peace On The Korean Peninsula

専門家らが朝鮮半島の平和の見通しを討議

【東京IDN＝浅霧勝浩】

朝鮮戦争（１９５０～５３）における「戦闘行為と武力行使の完全停止」をもたらした休戦協定から６６年が経過した。休戦協定の一年後、中国の周恩来首相兼外相は和平条約を提起したが、米国のジョン・フォスター・ダレス国務長官が拒否したため、朝鮮半島の最終的な平和解決は未だに成立していない。

休戦協定が署名されたことで、南北朝鮮の事実上の国境である非武装地帯（DMZ）が設定されて停戦が発効し、戦時捕虜の本国送還を終了した。非武装地帯は３８度線に沿って置かれ、１９５３年の休戦協定発効以来、北朝鮮と韓国を分断している。

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Europe Ventures to Speak Up Against USA

By Somar Wijayadasa*

NEW YORK | MUNICH (IDN) – “The whole liberal world order appears to be falling apart – nothing is as it once was,” said Wolfgang Ischinger, a senior German diplomat in an opinion article in the run-up to the 2019 Munich Security Conference (MSC) that he chairs.

He added: “When Vladimir Putin annexed Crimea and started the bloody conflict in Eastern Ukraine in 2014, many considered him to be the major cause of global destabilization.” [2019-02-22]

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A Nuclear Arms Race Will Produce No Winners

Despite everything, it is still in our power to avoid nuclear confrontation.

Viewpoint by Mikhail Gorbachev*

MOSCOW (IDN-INPS) – The fate of the INF treaty has politicians and ordinary people worried on every continent. I am also concerned, and not only because I signed that treaty with former U.S. President Ronald Reagan in Dec. 1987. These events are yet another manifestation of the dangerous and destructive trends in world politics facing us today. [2019-02-21]

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Experts Discuss Prospects Of Peace On The Korean Peninsula

By Katsuhiro Asagiri

TOKYO (IDN) – Nearly 66 years have passed since the Armistice Agreement formally brought about “a complete cessation of hostilities” of the Korean War. One year later, Chinese Premier and Foreign Minister Zhou Enlai proposed a peace treaty. But U.S. Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, refused – leaving a final peace settlement on the Korean Peninsula hanging in the air. [2019-02-20 | P21] CHINESE | JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF | KOREAN | SPANISH

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