Felicity Hill

"Governments say its premature to talk about a nuclear weapons convention – don’t believe it – they said the same thing about a landmine treaty." -- Jody Williams, Nobel Laureate

The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons was launched around the world in April 2007 by the International Physician for the Prevention of Nuclear War. The goal? A Nuclear Weapons Convention.

The good news: Unlike the landmines campaign, we already have 125 countries in the UN General Assembly voting explicitly to start getting on with such a convention. The vast majority of governments don't have and don't want nuclear weapons. A Model Nuclear Weapons Convention drafted by a group of legal and technical experts was submitted as an official document by governments at the recent nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty meeting, and for the first time an NPT meeting outcome document mentioned that "support was voiced for a nuclear weapons convention."

The bad news: On nuclear issues, things have rarely looked bleaker and more discouraging. There is a lot of evidence that nuclear weapons in the hands of some create the desire and justification for proliferation. Now there are nine nuclear weapons possessing states, states possessed by nuclear weapons. The war in Iraq, that started on the pretext of non-existent WMD, rages; there are plans to militarise space; military spending is beyond the absurdity of Cold War levels; treaties are being ignored, evaded and belittled; instead of decisions and action we are getting procedural Olympics or unkept promises and there is resentment and anger brewing at this bad faith and at the normalisation of nuclear weapons in the hands of some.

ICAN is a wake up call from medical professionals around the world. Nuclear abolition – doctors orders!

Recently an important turning point was marked - the 200th anniversary of the end of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. The reason slavery was outlawed is because an abolitionist movement grew, and continued to believe and work even when it appeared there would be no end to the cruel profiteering. This movement was made up of a small number of persistent and increasingly effective people, who were able to arouse the imaginations of larger numbers of people, including influential people, who said No to slavery and Yes to human rights. This anniversary was celebrated because outlawing a shameful social behaviour and violent political practice is worth celebrating. The people who stood up to the cruel profiteers of slavery had a courage that is inspiring and instructive to us today. We remember their names and stories with gratitude and respect. That abolitionist movement would not accept a little bit of regulated slavery under safeguarded conditions. Those abolitionists kept their "eyes on the prize" and they used the word abolition quite deliberately; no slavery whatsoever would be tolerated, because slavery itself is unacceptable.

The immoral threat of annihilating whole cities, populations, countries or even civilisation with nuclear weapons belongs in the past. In the future, anniversaries that mark the abolition of nuclear weapons will be celebrated, because nuclear weapons are unacceptable to the vast majority of nations and people who recognise that they are the result of shameful social behaviour and violent political practice that humanity will evolve from.

The prize we keep our eyes on is a Nuclear Weapons Convention. It is primarily a treaty – a negotiated agreement or package of linked agreements – but it is also a set of customs or accepted practices, which will reflect norms, or universal principles. The principles are about our survival, now and into the future, and the conditions under which we can best secure it. The practices are about how states and peoples relate to one another internationally, the tools they need to maintain and enhance genuine security.

The treaty will include a mixture of legal, technical and political elements and establish a series of steps to comprehensively prohibit, and systematically eliminate, all nuclear weapons. It will derive from current commitments, legal obligations and security requirements of States, as such providing a practical and realistic path to nuclear weapons abolition.

There is a lot you can do – start by informing yourself on the ICAN website <www.icanw.org> (and check out the short video while you're there), put your name on the petition and sign up for updates.

I can, you can, we can and they can make a nuclear-free world!