Panic as Russian missiles pass CRITICALLY close to nuclear power plant, as Putin’s ‘grave health worsens’
Panic as Russian missiles pass CRITICALLY close to nuclear power plant, as Putin’s ‘grave health worsens’ https://www.thesun.ie/news/8910728/russia-ukraine-vladimir-putin-latest-health-news/ 26 June 22,
VLADIMIR PUTIN has been accused of “nuclear terrorism” by leading Ukrainian officials after Russian missiles passed “critically” close to a nuclear power station.
Ukraine’s national nuclear company, Energoatom, accused Russia of committing “another act of nuclear terrorism.”
Missiles were reportedly seen passing over the plant earlier today.
Meanwhile, according to the Daily Star, a Kremlin source has claimed the dictator only has “two years left to live” as his health enters a “grave” condition.
According to the paper, top Ukrainian intelligence official, Major General Kyrylo O. Budanov, said the despot “doesn’t have a long life ahead of him.”
This comes after Budanov told Sky News that Putin was suffering from cancer.
No Western ”boots on the ground” in Ukraine? Just commandoes and CIA agents,
Western ‘network of commandos and spies’ helping Ukraine – NYTCIA agents have been stationed in Kiev to share US intel with Ukrainian troops, the report claims https://www.rt.com/news/557848-us-cia-agents-kiev/ NATO members have been supplying Ukraine with heavy weapons, including missile launchers, combat drones and armored vehicles, and training Ukrainian troops to use them. In recent months, the Pentagon has delivered M142 HIMARS multiple rocket launchers and M777 howitzers.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said last week that Ukraine was facing “a pivotal moment on the battlefield” and urged Washington’s allies to continue aiding Kiev.
The report about the activities of Western commandos and CIA agents in and around Ukraine comes as a three-day Group of Seven (G7) summit kicks off in Germany on Sunday. The group, which comprises of the US, Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Japan, which have imposed sweeping sanctions on Russia.
Moscow has said in the past that it will treat foreign weapons, on Ukrainian soil, as legitimate targets.
A secret network of commandos and spies from the US, and some of its allies, is working to provide weapons, intelligence and training to Ukraine, the New York Times (NYT) reported on Saturday, citing current and former American and European officials.
While much of the activity takes place at bases in Britain, Germany and France, some CIA agents have been stationed in the east European country, mostly in the capital Kiev, the paper said.
The agents are tasked with sharing satellite images and other intelligence with Ukrainian troops, according to the story.
The US announced the evacuation of military instructors from Ukraine in February. Shortly afterwards, Russia launched its military campaign and the US Army’s 10th Special Forces Group set up a planning cell in Germany to coordinate military aid to Kiev, the paper explained. The group has reportedly grown to include participants from 20 nations.
The NYT added that “a few dozen commandos” from other NATO member states, including Canada, Britain, France and Lithuania, have also been working in Ukraine.
NATO members have been supplying Ukraine with heavy weapons, including missile launchers, combat drones and armored vehicles, and training Ukrainian troops to use them. In recent months, the Pentagon has delivered M142 HIMARS multiple rocket launchers and M777 howitzers.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said last week that Ukraine was facing “a pivotal moment on the battlefield” and urged Washington’s allies to continue aiding Kiev.
The report about the activities of Western commandos and CIA agents in and around Ukraine comes as a three-day Group of Seven (G7) summit kicks off in Germany on Sunday. The group, which comprises of the US, Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Japan, which have imposed sweeping sanctions on Russia.
Moscow has said in the past that it will treat foreign weapons, on Ukrainian soil, as legitimate targets.
Thousands March in Madrid for Peace and “NATO NO”.
Thousands March in Madrid for Peace and “NATO NO”. https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Thousands-March-in-Madrid-for-Peace-and-NATO-NO—20220626-0005.html&source=gmail&ust=1656372213390000&usg=AOvVaw3X62tTdIvq0p0thk8VygFj The Sao Paulo Forum, the Women’s International Democratic Federation, Ecologists in Action, Pacifists Foundation; Not to war, Not to Nato; Plataforma Madrid and pacifist associations from France, Germany, Norway, Sweden and Italy, among others, emphasized the need to maintain the protests and not allow NATO to dictate the future. The Summit for Peace “NATO NO” that took place in Madrid, reiterated its rejection of militarism, while expressing its repudiation of the Atlantic alliance, and ended its deliberations with the demonstration from Atocha station to Plaza de España.
Some 10 thousand people marched today through the center of the capital in favor of peace and in rejection of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), in particular the Summit for Peace “NATO NO” to be held here.
The parade along the Paseo del Prado, passing by the fountain and the Cibeles palace, took the Gran Vía in a march in which emblematic songs such as El pueblo unido, jamás será vencido, by the Chilean Víctor Jara, and La Muralla, based on the verses of the Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén, stood out.
The demonstrators’ posters and statements were dominated by slogans in favor of peace, repudiation of wars and invasions, interference in the internal affairs of nations through the use of military force and disrespect for the sovereignty of peoples by NATO, as well as harsh criticism of the European Union (EU).
In the Final Declaration of the so-called Madrid counter-summit, the participants from various countries indicated that “NATO 360º has become a threat to peace, an obstacle to progress towards shared and demilitarized security”.
They considered that the Atlantic alliance, which will hold its summit meeting on the 29th and 30th at the IFEMA-Madrid fairgrounds, turns its back on the real problems of the planet, namely hunger, disease, inequality, unemployment, lack of public services, land and wealth grabbing, and the climate crisis.
The alternative summit, for Peace, against NATO and against wars, underlines the obligation as a human species, to build and defend peace 360º, from north to south, from east to west. This implies renouncing militarism as a way of dealing with conflicts, said the declaration of the meeting.
The Sao Paulo Forum, the Women’s International Democratic Federation, Ecologists in Action, Pacifists Foundation; Not to war, Not to Nato; Plataforma Madrid and pacifist associations from France, Germany, Norway, Sweden and Italy, among others, emphasized the need to maintain the protests and not allow NATO to dictate the future.
What happened at Santa Susana? — Beyond Nuclear International
A meltdown contaminated a community. A fire made it worse
What happened at Santa Susana? — Beyond Nuclear International A 1959 meltdown and a 2018 fire compounded a tragedy
By Carmi Orenstein
When the United Nations Human Rights Council officially recognized access to “a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment” as a basic human right earlier last October, it was an acknowledgement fifty years in the making. It was backed by an international grassroots effort, with the journey to the final vote including the voices of more than 100,000 children around the world and multiple generations of allies pushing against powerful corporate opposition.
Just about the time that this half-century-long campaign to enshrine the right to a safe environment kicked off, a story about the horrific violation of this same human right and its cover-up emerged in a community near my own childhood home in Southern California.
In 1979, a UCLA student named Michael Rose uncovered evidence of a partial nuclear meltdown at the Santa Susana Field Lab (SSFL) in the Simi Hills outside of Los Angeles. The SSFL, formerly known as Rocketdyne, played key government roles throughout the Cold War, developing and testing rocket engines and conducting experiments with nuclear reactors. Today, as the result of a recently published peer-reviewed study that represents the dogged efforts of both professional researchers and a team of specially trained citizens, we have solid evidence of the spread of dangerous contamination from that site.
Working with nuclear safety expert and then-UCLA professor Daniel Hirsch, Rose discovered documentation that the partial nuclear meltdown had occurred at SSFL twenty years earlier in 1959, releasing up to 459 times more radiation into the environment than the infamous meltdown at the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor in Pennsylvania. Unlike the Three Mile Island facility, the SSFL reactors lacked containment structures—those tell-tale concrete domes that surround commercial nuclear power plants to prevent radiation spread in case of a nuclear accident.
In addition to the 1959 meltdown, at least three of the site’s other nuclear reactors experienced accidents (in 1957, 1964 and 1969), and radioactive and chemical wastes burned in open-air pits as a matter of practice. A “hot lab,” which may have been the nation’s largest, was also located at SSFL, and, in 1957, it burned and was known to have spread radioactivity throughout the site. A progress report from the period states, “Because such massive contamination was not anticipated, the planned logistics of cleanup were not adequate for the situation.”
The rest of this story is an object lesson in what happens when the right to a safe environment is not universally acknowledged and when secretive, long-forgotten toxic legacies of the Cold War meet the unpredictable chaos of the current climate crisis. Real people are harmed in ways that are not easily remediable—including, perhaps, members of my family.
The radioactive contamination of the surrounding environment caused by the partial nuclear meltdown at the 2,849-acre SSFL site was not cleaned up by the time of Rose’s revelation. Nor was the extensive toxic chemical contamination on site. It is still not cleaned up. Thus, when the climate chaos-fueled Woolsey Fire erupted at, and burned through, the SSFL in 2018, the flames served to spread the contamination even further. The fire quickly burned 80 percent of the SSFL property, and onward, all the way to the ocean. Pushed by high winds and uncontained for nearly two weeks, the Woolsey Fire killed three people outright and destroyed over 1,600 structures.
Today, public knowledge of the original disaster and its continued radioactive and toxic legacy is still patchy. The silence that surrounded the catastrophe in 1959 gave way to intermittent waves of focused media attention, celebrity involvement, and inquiry and outcry on the part of elected officials in the years since the 1979 expose. These have been followed by whistleblower accounts from former workers, and various forms of citizen activism. While occasional news of confidential legal settlements addressing illness and contamination breaks through, the Santa Susana disaster is hardly a household name—including among those of us who grew up in its shadow.
The suburbs on either side of the SSFL, in Ventura County and a western edge of Los Angeles County, are still expanding. More than 500,000 people currently live within about ten miles of the site. Parents vs. SSFL is the dynamic, parent-led group currently at the helm of public monitoring of, and demand for, a comprehensive cleanup. On their social media sites, one often sees public comments from nearby residents along the lines of why were we not told?
To be sure, the history of site ownership and responsibility is complex and makes redress of grievance vexing. Although Rocketdyne owned the facility at the time of the meltdown, most of the site is now owned by Boeing. However, some of the property is owned by NASA, who in turn leases parts of its property as SSFL to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). California’s Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC), the lead regulatory agency for remediation, entered into a Consent Order with these “responsible parties,” in 2007. In 2010, stricter agreements were signed with DOE and NASA to clean up the properties for which they are responsible to “background levels.”
In 2017 a legally binding agreement deadline for completion of cleanup was blown by, with no meaningful cleanup begun. In 2018 the Woolsey Fire came roaring through. That fire is now documented to have redistributed radioactive materials and toxic chemicals in surrounding areas. Non-binding, confidential negotiations with Boeing were just announced early this year. It is a confounding and maddening journey to anyone attempting to follow.
As Melissa Bumstead, co-founder of Parents vs SSFL, said in a Physicians for Social Responsibility-Los Angeles press release about the new study: “The bottom line is, if SSFL had been cleaned up by 2017 as required by the cleanup agreements, the community wouldn’t have had to worry about contamination released by the Woolsey Fire.” …………………………………….
UCLA professor of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences Suzanne E. Paulson also weighed in. Speaking to a reporter the next year, Paulson explained,
Assuming that radioactive material was in the soil [and] vegetation burned, it is reasonable that it traveled 30 miles downwind, and some of it got deposited in downwind areas… When soil and vegetation burn, the material in them, including metals [and] soil minerals, end up in the aerosol particles that make smoke look dark and hazy. They are small enough that they can remain in the atmosphere for up to a week and as a result can be widely dispersed.
At the end of 2018, just weeks after the Woolsey Fire was finally extinguished, work commenced on the independent study that was ultimately published online in early October and would appear in the December 2021 issue of the Journal of Environmental Radioactivity. This paper represents the work of community-volunteer citizen scientists who were trained to collect dust and ash samples in a 9-mile radius throughout the rural, urban, suburban, and undeveloped mountainous area around the SSFL. Their data collection was followed by the slow and careful work of scientific analysis. In a society whose governmental structures and policies decidedly are not guided by the Precautionary Principle today, and where there are no efficient mechanisms by which to correct past regulatory errors—no matter how grave—these volunteers and their three research leaders have provided powerful, incriminating evidence with which the community and its allies will push forward for the cleanup.
…………………………. “Woolsey Fire ash did, in fact, spread SSFL-related radioactive microparticles.” The authors also wrote, “Excessive alpha radiation in small particles is of particular interest because of the relatively high risk of inhalation-related long-term biological damage from internal alpha emitters compared to external radiation.”……………………………………………..
How did the entities with knowledge and power continue to delay and obstruct while the population boomed and crept up the hillsides near the SSFL, knowing full well that powerful human health hazards were there to meet the communities, new and old? The statement by DTSC proclaiming that no contaminants were carried, while the Woolsey Fire was still burning, smacks of the most brazen regulatory capture. …………………………….. Carmi Orenstein is Program Director at Concerned Heath Professionals of New York. https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/72759838/posts/4098311628
World facing real risk of ‘multiple famines’ this year, UN chief warns
World facing real risk of ‘multiple famines’ this year, UN chief warns
As the Group of Seven wealthy countries begins a three-day meeting in Germany, the UN has called for action to help tackle a global hunger crisis compounded by the war in Ukraine.
Welcome to the ‘Pandemicene’
As humans encroach on the natural world, more deadly pandemics are likely to follow COVID. Why? Here’s everything you need to know:………………. https://theweek.com/covid-19/1014609/welcome-to-the-pandemicene
June 26 Energy News — geoharvey
Opinion: ¶ “What Firefighters Can Teach Us About Preparing The Grid For Extreme Weather” • Preparing for emergencies and preventing disasters requires planning, equipment, and communications. This is as true for operating the electric power system in extreme weather as it is for fighting fires. For emergencies, firefighters and utilities both share resources. [CleanTechnica] Firefighters […]
June 26 Energy News — geoharvey
“Truly historic” First Meeting of States Parties concludes! -UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons
ICAN Australia, 24 June 22, The first Meeting of States Parties to the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons has just concluded in Vienna! To great applause, the meeting adopted a political declaration and an action plan to take the work of the treaty forward. Read them here.
There were 82 states in attendance, including the Australian Government attending as an observer, along with other nuclear-endorsing states Germany, Norway, Belgium and the Netherlands.
The Australian delegation participated constructively in the meeting, engaging with many delegations including the ICAN team in Vienna. Susan Templeman MP, head of the delegation, also made time to join our Nuclear Ban Hub online on Wednesday night.
At the conclusion of the meeting the Chair, Ambassador Alexander Kmentt, said:
“I think we’ve accomplished something truly historic…
We have a powerful and clear political declaration that we do not accept the nuclear status quo of the sword of Damocles above us…
The path is prepared and the real work starts, so let us continue to work in this spirit and show the world what kind of progress is possible.”
TODAY. To survive, the human species must heed the voices of small nations, and of babes and sucklings
We really don’t have time for the antics of the big tough men that run the world – on corporate greed, vying with each other for power and importance. They’ve brought us global heating, planetary and even space pollution, and their next trick is nuclear war.
They don’t seem to ”get it” that if you blow the other lot to smithereens, it doesn’t actually help your lot at all.
I recall that the King of Siam as played by Yul Brynner way back, reflected that ‘‘Unless some day somebody trusts somebody – there’ll be nothing left on Earth excepting fishes”
The King of Siam was an optimist – as human stupidity and greed are already bringing about the end of the fishes.
BUT – the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons is right now being discussed and worked on by representatives of over 100 governments. 122 governments are in favour of it, 86 have signed up to it, and 65 have ratified it. It is wisely designed, allowing even nuclear state to join, with reasonable steps.
But no. The big boys of the weapons corporations and the military run the show, so of course, they spurn this Treaty, and the opinions of the little nations. After all, the little nations are expendable, like all the ordinary little folk that are going to be obliterated by weather extremes, and by a nuclear weapon, however ”successfully” that weapon might be used.
Today, as Fiji joins the Treaty, we hear a wise and sensible opinion on the way forward. We need to learn from those ”unimportant” little nations, from indigenous peoples, from ”ignorant” children and young people – because we sure ain’t getting any wisdom from the world ”leaders”
MP Susan Templeman represents Australia at landmark nuclear weapons ban treaty in Vienna
MP Susan Templeman represents Australia at landmark nuclear weapons ban treaty in Vienna ttps://www.bluemountainsgazette.com.au/story/7791272/mp-susan-templeman-represents-australia-at-landmark-nuclear-weapons-ban-treaty-in-vienna/Federal Member for Macquarie Susan Templeman has attended the first Meeting of State Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).
Joining the conference as an observer, the Labor MP’s attendance was welcomed by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN). A spokesperson said they see see it as “recognition the newly-elected federal government is willing to engage with this critical meeting as a step towards signature and ratification [of the treaty]”.
Held from June 21 to 23 in Vienna, Austria, Australia’s attendance as an observer will provide insights into how states parties intend to address serious questions about the treaty, including:
the adequacy of the TPNW’s verification and enforcement regime;- interaction with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), which the Australian Government considers to be the cornerstone of the international disarmament and non-proliferation regime;
- how states parties will work to achieve universal support, especially that of nuclear-weapon states.
“It was great to be in Austria to observe the first Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) on behalf of Australia,” said Ms Templeman.
“Australia shares the ambition of TPNW states parties of a world free of nuclear weapons.”
Australia is not a party to the TPNW and Ms Templeman’s attendance as an observer does not represent a decision to join the treaty.
ICAN Australia campaigner Jemila Rushton, who is also in Vienna this week for the historic meeting, welcomed the Australian government’s decision to participate.
“We’re delighted that Australia will be officially represented at this important meeting. It’s a first step towards our country becoming a TPNW state party,” she said.
Australia will also attend the fourth Conference on the Humanitarian Impacts of Nuclear Weapons, hosted by Austria.
China accuses the US and UK of hypocrisy on press freedom for calling out Beijing’s crackdowns while putting Australian Wikileaks founder Julian Assange on trial for espionage
- China accuses US and UK of hypocrisy over extradition of Julian Assange
- Assange set to face charges in the US over leaking of classified US documents
- Chinese say the ‘trumped up’ charges expose press freedom double standards
- Australian government says it is quietly discussing the case with US authorities
By DAVID SOUTHWELL FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA 21 June 2022 China has branded US and UK hypocrites on press freedom over the looming extradition of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange to face espionage charges that could land the Australian in jail for life.
Assange’s extradition to the US to face charges over the leaking of thousands of official secrets has been approved by British Home Secretary Priti Patel after a protracted legal battle.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin accused the US of pursuing ‘trumped up’ charges against Assange for exposing secrets about the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and about the CIA’s cyber attacks against other countries.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said that the US and UK were conspiring against Assange using ‘trumped up’ charges to punish him for exposing US wrongdoing.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said that the US and UK were conspiring against Assange using ‘trumped up’ charges to punish him for exposing US wrongdoing.
‘The US and Britain are cooperating in cross-border crackdowns on certain individuals,’ he said.
The case of Assange is a mirror that shows how hypocritical the US and Britain’s claim to uphold press freedom is.
‘People enjoy fully freedoms to expose other countries and will be regarded as heroes if they do so, but they will be severely punished and considered to be criminals if they expose their own country or its allies and partners.’
……… Mr Wenbin said all eyes would be on Mr Assange’s human rights and expressed the hope that ‘justice’ would prevail over ‘abuse and hegemony’.
………….. His defenders argue he exposed US war crimes and human rights abuses in Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, Iraq, and Afghanistan, as well as revealing the CIA’s covert activities against its own citizens…………………..
There have been calls for Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to make a public plea on behalf of Assange, which so far he has resisted.
Employment Minister Tony Burke said the government was making quiet ‘behind-the-scenes’ representations to the US over the case..……………. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10936875/China-calls-UK-press-freedom-hypocrites-Julian-Assange-trial.html
Australia’s Nuclear past and future
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/nightlife/australias-nuclear-past-and-future/13941420 Richard Broinowsli on ABC Radio, 22 June 22, Australia’s complex relationship with nuclear technology has crossed most aspects of the industry – from uranium mining through to current defence policies. Our guest – former diplomat, Richard Broinowski has updated his authoritative account of Australia’s nuclear journey to include recent events such as the AUKUS deal.
People Don’t Think Hard Enough About What Nuclear War Is And What It Would Mean
Caitlin Johnstone, https://caitlinjohnstone.substack.com/p/people-dont-think-hard-enough-about 23 June 22,
There’s a John Mearsheimer video clip from 2016 that’s going viral on Twitter right now, as old John Mearsheimer clips tend to do in the year 2022 when his predictions that western actions would lead to the destruction of Ukraine are coming horrifyingly true.
In response to a question about what the worst US foreign policy disaster has been, Mearsheimer agreed with a fellow panelist that at that moment Iraq looked like the worst, but said he believed US policy on Ukraine would prove much worse in coming years. He spoke of the fact that Russia has thousands of nuclear weapons, and that it’s entirely possible those weapons will be used if Russia feels threatened.
Because the Cold War is in the distant past, most people, especially younger people, haven’t thought a lot about nuclear weapons and nuclear deterrence, and they tend to be quite cavalier in their comments about nuclear weapons, and this makes me very nervous,” Mearsheimer said.
It makes me nervous too. Especially when we’ve got a steadily escalating proxy war which the standoff in Lithuania could easily see spin out into a direct hot war between Russia and NATO powers, and when we hear the UK’s top army general telling troops to prepare for World War Three.
Most of what I see in public discourse about escalating aggressions between the US power alliance and Russia reflects the cavalier attitude Mearsheimer spoke of in 2016, as do my own interactions with people online. Most of what I’m seeing in the behavior of NATO powers indicates this cavalier attitude about nuclear weapons as well. People, from the rank-and-file public to the upper echelons of empire management, don’t seem to be thinking very hard about what nuclear war is and what it would mean.
As Mearsheimer said, this does seem to be because we’re so removed now from the days when everyone was acutely aware that the missiles could start flying at any time.
It just doesn’t sit well with people’s understanding of the world that it could all end through the same nuclear armageddon scenario their grandparents used to worry about. If two men were holding guns to each other’s heads it would be experienced as very dangerous at first, but after a while if nobody pulled the trigger the emotional tension would begin to diminish. If years went by and the men got older it would diminish even further. If they got so old they couldn’t hold the guns anymore and had their children take over for them, and then their children’s children years later, the emotional experience of the standoff would be all but forgotten.
But the guns never got any less deadly. The fact that nuclear war hasn’t happened yet means only that: that it hasn’t happened yet. Things that have never happened before happen all the time. There didn’t used to be nuclear weapons, now there are. Earth is currently a habitable planet, one day soon it may not be.
We came within a hair’s breadth of wiping ourselves out during the last cold war, not just once but many times. Any amount of nuclear brinkmanship opens up the possibility of nuclear war erupting in ways that are too hard to anticipate and plan for, because there are too many small moving parts, too many ways a nuke could be detonated as a result of technical malfunction, miscommunication, miscalculation and/or misunderstanding. The further things escalate between the world’s two nuclear superpowers, the greater the likelihood of this happening.
And of course the powerful have every reason to encourage this way of thinking to continue. If a critical mass of the population really understood that their lives are being threatened with nuclear war for no other reason than the US empire’s willingness to risk everything to secure planetary hegemony, they would immediately become hard to deal with. Empire managers plan on not just engaging in nuclear brinkmanship but also making things much harder on the public financially in their long-term agendas against Russia and China, and the only way everyone plays along with this is if they are kept from understanding what’s being done to them.
This is why the media have been acting so strange in recent years. Agendas are being rolled out which no sane person would consent to if they fully understood them, so their consent needs to be manufactured with massive amounts of propaganda. It’s also why internet censorship has taken a high priority during that same period of time: can’t have people using their newfound information-sharing capability to interfere in the narrative manipulations of the empire.
We’re being sedated into a propaganda-induced coma while immensely powerful people play profoundly dangerous games with our lives. It is in our interest to find a way to awaken as soon as possible.
Let us move towards a world without nuclear weapons
Joint Statement by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) – First Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons – Vienna, Austria,
21-23 June 2022
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the International Federation (IFRC), which is composed of 192 National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, are honored to jointly address this first meeting of the States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).
The Japanese Red Cross Society and the ICRC were among the first responders to the atomic bombings of 1945. Having understood the horrors of nuclear warfare and the limits of our capacity to help, the international Movement of the Red Cross and Red Crescent is steadfastly committed to ensuring that these weapons are never again used and are eliminated.
The new international legal norm comprehensively prohibiting nuclear weapons in the TPNW is an historic achievement. It reflects global revulsion towards these weapons. It honors the hopes and dreams of atomic bomb survivors or “hibakusha” and the memory of so many victims who have not lived to see this day. The Japanese Red Cross, through its hospitals for hibakusha in Hiroshima and Nagasaki has for decades come to know and care for tens of thousands of survivors. As a representative of Japanese Red Cross youth, I would like to share some of what we have learned from the hibakusha.
Hibakusha have taught us why the scenes they lived through must “never again” happen anywhere on this earth. Their persistence, patience and humility have moved us and motivated us. As fewer and fewer hibakusha remain with us today Japanese Red Cross youth are committed to keeping their voices and stories alive for future generations. Without the testimony of the hibakusha nuclear weapons can become just a military-technical abstraction devoid of the ghastly horrors they rain down upon people and their societies. With the TPNW we now have a crucial tool that most hibakusha could only dream of: a global treaty that recognizes the horrors of nuclear weapons and bans them on humanitarian, moral and legal grounds. We thank the States Parties for responding to the appeal of humanity by establishing this legacy and invite all others to do the same.
Mr. President,
The Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement has consistently called for the prohibition of nuclear weapons since 1945. Recent advocacy efforts were launched by a resolution of our 2011 Council of Delegates that helped re-frame the nuclear weapons issue in human terms. The ICRC and National Societies throughout the world played a key role in the “humanitarian initiative” on nuclear weapons that gave rise to the TPNW and in supporting its negotiation in 2017.
Tomorrow, the same Council of Delegates is expected to adopt a new resolution and multi-year Action Plan on nuclear weapons that will welcome the adoption and entry into force of the TPNW and recommit the Movement to continuing work in all contexts to reduce the risks of nuclear weapon use and to keeping the catastrophic human costs of these weapons at the center of national and international debates. The draft resolution commits the Movement to “seizing with determination and urgency the unique opportunities provided by the entry into force of the TPNW to ensure that it ushers in a new era for nuclear disarmament and nuclear non-proliferation”. Our Movement will work tirelessly to promote all States’ adherence to the TPNW and its implementation as well as adherence to and faithful implementation of other mutually reinforcing international legal instruments on nuclear weapons.
We are grateful that article 7.5 of the TPNW recognizes the ICRC, the IFRC and National Red Cross and Crescent Societies as potential partners in providing assistance for implementation of the treaty and most notably assistance for the victims of nuclear weapon use or testing.
As a Movement with long experience assisting hibakusha while also assisting the victims of radiation releases following several major accidents at civilian nuclear facilities, we appreciate the trust given to us by States Parties. We warmly welcome the draft Action Plan being considered by this meeting and stand ready to support States Parties in treaty universalization, national legislation where needed, as well as in victim assistance. We look forward to opportunities to engage with States Parties in need of assistance in the preparation of the national plans called for in the draft action plan. We would also consider expanding our own support for victim assistance, to the extent possible, based on such plans and available resources.
In closing, we call upon all States to recognize the crucial role that the TPNW plays in international efforts to prevent the “catastrophic consequences that would result from any use of nuclear weapons” that all States Parties to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty have recognized.
States have a solemn responsibility to prevent these consequences, to reduce the risk that nuclear weapons will ever again be used and to move towards a world without nuclear weapons.
The TPNW now provides a road map to this end. Nuclear disarmament is a legal obligation under the NPT, a moral duty, and above all, a humanitarian imperative aimed at nothing less than ensuring the survival of humanity.
Fiji adopts nuclear weapons ban treaty
Fiji adopts nuclear treaty https://www.fijitimes.com/fiji-adopts-nuclear-treaty/ WANSHIKA KUMAR 23 June, 2022,
The cost of producing nuclear weapons is keeping resources away from addressing issues that matter like climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic and global food shortage.
This was the view expressed by Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama during the first Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapon.
Fiji joined over 86 states to adopt a treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons and take the first step back from the knife edge of Armageddon.
Mr Bainimarama said they would work with all states to ensure a nuclear-free world and to heal the wounds of a dark nuclear legacy that continued to harm lives and communities throughout the region.
It is not idealism that convinced us, it is level-headed commonsense that calls on us to do away with this means of species extinction,” he said.
“Neither are we the fringe of the debate, we are a coalition, united by a shared value for human life.”
He said Fiji had contributed more of its sons and daughters to United Nations peacekeeping missions than any other country per capita.
“A global food crisis rages on a scale not seen in our lifetimes and a runaway climate crisis threatening livelihoods and the very future of our civilisation.
“Nuclear weapons will never defeat these enemies, they do not feed us, and they do not clothe us or keep out the rising seas.
“They are relics, multitrillion dollar monuments to the worst horror that war can create. They epitomise the same short-sightedness that created the climate crisis, worsen the pandemic and continues to keep food from the hungry.
“Worse, the staggering expense cripples our response to these challenges.”
Mr Bainimarama said the region had been used as a testing ground for nuclear weapons, and the perpetrators had turned a blind eye to the repercussions of their actions.
“We welcome this treaty’s consideration of the plight of those affected by the use and testing of nuclear weapons who have been silenced and denied the care and support they needed.
“I urge us to go further for these survivors by creating a policy framework that considers the existential impact on the nuclear testing of our oceans and environment, exacerbated by the climate crisis, and its long term consequences of the displacement of communities from the traditional lands due to ever encroaching nuclear waste.”
1 This month.
PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/235274195556
19 May – Webinar- Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-05-19 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-05-19 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
20 May – Webinar – The dangerous world of AUKUS, US, military occupation and suppression of dissent
National Webinar, 20th May, 2026, 6.30pm AEST. Confronting laws restricting/suppressing protest speech and action
Speakers: Former Sen. Rex Patrick, Lawyer Nick Hanna ,Arthur Rorris ,Jorgen Doyle, Sen David Shoebbridge,
Facilitator Kelley Tranter.
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 