The nuclear weapons ban convention and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
The nuclear weapons ban convention and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization

Author(s): Miroslav Tůma
Subject(s): International Law, Civil Society, International relations/trade, Security and defense
Published by: Ústav mezinárodních vztahů
Keywords: NATO; Nuclear Disarmament;
Summary/Abstract: This year, there will be an international conference in the headquarters of the UN in New York. The conference will have a mandate to negotiate an agreement to ban nuclear weapons. Besides being attended by member states of the UN, the conference will be attended by representatives of some non-specified international organizations and civic society representatives. The conference will be held on the basis of a resolution which has been adopted by the First Committee (the United Nations Committee on Disarmament and International Security) during the 71stUN General Assembly at the end of October 2016 (A/C.1/71/L.41) and subsequently adopted at a plenary session of the United Nations General Assembly in December 2016 (A/RES/71/258). The resolution’s title Taking Forward Nuclear Disarmament Negotiations calls on the world to achieve progress in just that area. Its importance especially resides in the wording of some paragraphs of the operational part, which contain the decision to convene the above mentioned conference in 2017 to negotiate a legally binding instrument banning nuclear weapons, which should lead to their complete elimination. The content of the resolution has been influenced by recommendations of the final report of the Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG), which held talks in Geneva in the first half of 2016. It was to assess new legal measures and the needed standards for reaching a world without nuclear weapons. (The article follows up the International Law Reflection #10, issued on November 10th 2016)

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