Archive for the ‘START’ Category

Ratify START: Good Beginning on the way to the NPT Review Conference

April 5th, 2010 by Leonard Eiger from The Nuclear Abolitionist

Friends,

In just one month (on May 3rd) the 2010 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) will convene. Over a grueling 28 days representatives of nations that are parties to the NPT will try to strengthen the NPT and come to agreement on language to clarify and tighten up the treaty’s rather loose provisions (such as having no time frames or deadlines for disarmament).

With the Cold War a distant memory and potential new cold wars and proliferation looming it is absolutely critical that this NPT Review Conference not end with the lackluster results of previous conferences. However, there is a momentum building towards this year’s meeting.


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Senators on the New START Treaty

April 1st, 2010 by Manuela Saftoiu Kumar from Groundswell Blog, from Peace Action West » Nuclear Weapons

Now that President Obama and Russian President Medvedev are planning to sign the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) in Prague on April 8, our campaign to press the Senate to ratify the treaty is taking off.

Senate ratification of the treaty will be critical. The New START agreement is an important first-step in strengthening U.S. nuclear security by reducing the bloated U.S. and Russian nuclear weapons stockpiles, thereby helping to prevent accident launches and keep more nuclear weapons safely out of the hands of terrorists. Without ratification, the president’s efforts to build American leadership, by example, towards a world without nuclear weapons will be stalled. America’s credibility in working to stop nuclear proliferation would be badly damaged, because Senate refusal to ratify the treaty would lend those efforts an air of “do as we say, not as we do.”


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New year to bring new treaty on nuclear weapons reductions

December 18th, 2009 by Cara Bautista from Groundswell Blog, from Peace Action West » Nuclear Weapons

With a December 5th deadline come and gone, nuclear disarmament supporters hoping for a new treaty soon between the US and Russia on nuclear weapons reduction may have to wait a little longer. At Copenhagen for climate change talks, Presidents Obama and Medvedev squeezed in a meeting on the ongoing nuclear weapons negotiations. The Associated Press quotes a spokesman for negotiations saying that the New START agreement to reduce both countries’ nuclear arsenals may not be completed until January:

“It’s extremely complex putting together a treaty like this,” Parmly told The Associated Press.

“If you’re expecting a signing ceremony by the end of the year, that would be a tough calendar,” Parmly said. “In the mean time, though, they’re working.”


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New year to bring new treaty on nuclear weapons reductions

December 18th, 2009 by Cara Bautista from Groundswell Blog, from Peace Action West » Nuclear Weapons

With a December 5th deadline come and gone, nuclear disarmament supporters hoping for a new treaty soon between the US and Russia on nuclear weapons reduction may have to wait a little longer. At Copenhagen for climate change talks, Presidents Obama and Medvedev squeezed in a meeting on the ongoing nuclear weapons negotiations. The Associated Press quotes a spokesman for negotiations saying that the New START agreement to reduce both countries’ nuclear arsenals may not be completed until January:

“It’s extremely complex putting together a treaty like this,” Parmly told The Associated Press.

“If you’re expecting a signing ceremony by the end of the year, that would be a tough calendar,” Parmly said. “In the mean time, though, they’re working.”


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US and Russia Continue Negotiations for New START treaty

December 7th, 2009 by Cara Bautista from Groundswell Blog, from Peace Action West » Nuclear Weapons

This weekend, the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) between the US and Russia expired, but negotiators for both countries are working hard to finalize a new treaty, or “New START,” on verifiable nuclear weapons reductions by the end of the month. On Friday, the US and Russia issued this simple Joint Statement to help address concerns over the expiration of the treaty and its verification and inspection provisions:

Recognizing our mutual determination to support strategic stability between the United States of America and the Russian Federation, we express our commitment, as a matter of principle, to continue to work together in the spirit of the START Treaty following its expiration, as well as our firm intention to ensure that a new treaty on strategic arms enter into force at the earliest possible date.


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