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GSI Senior Officer Rhianna Tyson Kreger explains the synergy of GSI's unique programs on Global Connections TV.
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On TV New Zealand, Alyn Ware explains how President Obama’s Nuclear Security Summit this week in Washington is part of a series of initiatives to prevent nuclear proliferation and achieve nuclear disarmament – the most important of which could be the 4-week long Conference of States Parties to the Non-Proliferation Treaty taking place at the United Nations in May.
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Jonathan Granoff on Associated Press television discussing the security-enhancing cooperation facilitated by the new START treaty and the Nuclear Posture Review.
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On Russia Today, BSG Director and Chairman Ambassador Robert Grey Jr and Ambassador Thomas Graham Jr discuss the new START agreement and its effect on global non-proliferation efforts.
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May 31, 2010: Conference adopts 'best' document on nuke disarmament - The China Post
Jonathan Granoff, GSI President, believed the declaration is a small bug significant step that should be supported by the international community. "It indicates a forward-looking commitment to disarmament and thus warrants the support of the international community," Granoff said."
May 28, 2010: Nuclear conference adopts 'best' document on disarmament - Earth Times
New York - The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty review conference adopted Friday a declaration considered its best so far in pursuing the United Nations goal of nuclear disarmament and nuclear non-proliferation....The Global Security Institute, a nuclear disarmament think tank, said the declaration, even watered down by the nuclear powers that are allergic to legal timelines, could be a step forward.
Jonathan Granoff, GSI president, believed the declaration is a small but significant step that should be supported by the international community.
"It indicates a forward-looking commitment to disarmament and thus warrants the support of the international community," Granoff said.
April 19, 2010: Iran wants 'atomic criminal' US suspended from IAEA- Global Times
Mohammad Mehdi Akhondzadeh, Iranian deputy minister of foreign affairs for legal and international affairs, told the Global Times that Tehran has no intention "to clone or to echo the Washington summit," and Iran would like the meeting to be a first step toward nuclear disarmament. "We should not deny either the summit in Washington or in Tehran on nuclear disarmament and nuclear non-proliferation. As long as it is conducive to global nuclear safety, it should be encouraged," said Jonathan Granoff, president of the Global Security Institute.
April 18, 2010: Iran boasts its nuclear disarmament summit draws more support than Obama's - Daily Telegraph
Iranian officials boasted on Sunday that a nuclear disarmament summit hosted by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad over the weekend had drawn more global support than one held by US President Barack Obama in Washington earlier this month... Jonathan Granoff, president of New York-based Global Security Institute, said Iran should take up its own challenge on nuclear disarmament if it wanted to be taken seriously."Words without action are insufficient," he said. "I think we should have very strong monitoring and verification on all nuclear activity. Since Iran claims it does not have an ambition to make a nuclear weapon, it should take a unilateral decision to make its openness a model for the rest of the world."
April 8, 2010: Reducing role of nukes does not threaten US security, say experts - Xinhua
As America's new nuclear strategy makes headlines across the world, pundits, politicians and scientists in the United States have been debating whether reducing the role of nuclear weapons in deterring a non-nuclear attack serves national security interests... Some American publications ran with the review's reservation, printing headlines like, "Obama Threatens Iran with Nukes." But Jonathan Granoff, president of the Global Security Institute, a Washington D.C. organization focused on nuclear arms control, cautioned against reading them as a new threat. "The Nuclear Posture Review does not add any new threat to North Korea or Iran, it simply does not reward their recalcitrance in affirmatively cooperating with the non-proliferation and disarmament regime and all of its benefits," he told Xinhua. "Neither North Korea nor Iran pose the kind of threat to anyone today that would require a nuclear response that would outweigh the benefits of deterrence."
April 19, 2010: Activists tell Harper of growing hope for non-nuclear world - Western Catholic Reporter
Unprecedented momentum is building towards a nuclear weapon-free world and the opportunity must not be lost says retired Senator Douglas Roche. "This is certainly the most opportune moment that I have experienced in my lifetime for real concrete movement towards the elimination of nuclear weapons," Roche told journalists after an April 9 meeting with Stephen Harper.
April 4, 2010: Dramatic Arab Appeal for a Nuclear-Free World– Global Geopolitics and Political Economy
Call it perfect timing or a sheer historical coincidence; be it because they feel caught between the Israeli nuclear hammer and the Iranian might-be atomic anvil or just because they truly want it, the fact is that the leaders of 22 Arab countries have launched an unprecedented massive and pressing call to free the world from nuclear weapons…The initiatives range from civil society and grassroots organisations to Nobel Laureates and city mayors – such as Tadatoshi Akiba, Mayor of the City of Hiroshima, which together with Nagasaki continues to suffer the atrocious consequences of U.S. nuclear bombs during World War II – as well as world religious leaders among so many others…Among numerous international personalities campaigning for a nuclear-free world is Jayantha Dhanapala who presided over the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference, and was UN under-secretary-general for Disarmament Affairs from 1998-2003.
March 27, 2010: START Treaty details finalized - Russia Today
President Dmitry Medvedev and US President Barack Obama have agreed upon the final details of the new START treaty aimed at cutting stockpiles of nuclear warheads. The treaty will be signed in Prague on April 8...“Unless the Russians and the Americans are seen to be making progress in reducing their own weapons, they can’t logically expect the other people to take on new obligation,” said Ambassador Robert Grey from the Global Security Institute. “We demonstrate that we can reduce these weapons, we plan to reduce these weapons and therefore that gives us together a stronger hand with other countries,” acknowledged initial START treaty negotiator, Ambassador Thomas Graham.
February 23, 2010: Canada slow to adopt cluster bomb ban - Vancouver Foreign Policy Examiner
An international treaty banning the production and use of cluster munitions has now been ratified by 30 countries, and will enter into force on August 1, 2010. Developed during World War II, cluster bombs contain smaller bomblets designed to deter an advancing army over large areas but pose continuing dangers to civilians because of the many explosives that remain on the ground...The government has also recently been criticized on other foreign policy issues. Douglas Roche, retired senator and former ambassador for disarmament, has expressed concern over Canada's lack of initiative on control of nuclear weapons prior to the upcoming Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference. Also, results of an international poll conducted for the BBC this year in 20 countries indicate that Canada's influence is fading in the world, a situation attributed specifically to Canada's poor record in combating climate change.
February 22, 2010: Russia increases Iran cooperation - Jerusalem Post
Though it has failed to resolve the missile shield crisis, Russian President Vladimir Putin's offer to break the deadlock by placing a US missile defense system in Azerbaijan is the latest sign of growing Russian willingness to cooperate on Iran, those tracking the issue say. They point to an increasing awareness in Russia of the threat posed by Iran and a need to push the Islamic Republic following intransigence in the face of international demands that it halt its uranium enrichment efforts. ... "It's a positive development on the political and strategic level," said nuclear proliferation expert James Goodby, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Brookings Institution.
February 10, 2010: US Senate Republicans could use START to derail Obama's disarmament agenda - Xinhua
Even if Russia and the United States agreed next month on an arms treaty, it might be at least another six months away from ratification -- a process in the US legislature that could jeopardize the Obama administration's aggressive disarmament agenda, a veteran US arms control negotiator told Xinhua on Tuesday.
As Democrats do not have a decisive majority in the US Senate, Republicans have the opportunity to hold the successor to the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I) hostage to future obligations or conditions, said Ambassador Thomas Graham, who chairs the Bipartisan Security Group, a coalition of Republican and Democratic experts with experience in diplomacy, law, intelligence and military affairs.
February 2, 2010: Ask politicians to abolish nuclear weapons - WL Tribune
A Zero Nuclear Weapons forum was held in Council Chambers at Toronto
City Hall last November under the auspices of Mayors for Peace. Their 20/20 vision is no nuclear weapons by 2020. Former ambassador for disarmament and retired Canadian Senator Douglas Roche spoke at the forum saying we Canadians must write letters to your politicians on issues of nuclear weapons and climate change. He said your politicians need “heat from the street.”
Re-thinking Israeli Security
Huffington Post
by Rhianna Tyson Kreger
June 14, 2010
Jewish ingenuity helped create the weapon that is now the greatest threat to our survival. Let it also be Jewish brilliance, leadership, and morality that contribute towards the liberation of all humanity from the Damocles sword of nuclear weapons.
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Cutting the Gordian Knot
Peace and Health
by Xanthe Hall
April 25, 2010
Before you all physically or mentally traipse off to New York – volcanic ash allowing – I’d like to say something. Nuclear weapons do have a purpose. What I want to share with you may seem a tad too philosophical for your liking, but as the daughter of a philosopher and a nurse I feel that we may have been missing the point. Of course, we need to get rid of them. Like cancer, they are spreading disease that cause pain and suffering and no-one wants to talk about because of the feelings of helplessness they engender. But we are now, at last, really talking about nuclear weapons. That is a good start in the process of healing ourselves. Getting out of denial.
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Principles and Process
Arms Control Today
by Henrik Salander
April 2010
For anyone who attended the 2005 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference, where the parties failed to agree on anything at all, the recent debacle at the
Copenhagen
climate change conference seemed very familiar. In both cases, nation-based egocentrism made it impossible even to try to solve problems that are truly and fundamentally global, such as the health of the biosphere and weapons threatening to destroy the planet.
It is often said that another NPT review failure this year will signify the beginning of the end of the treaty. Such prophecies are risky, but also trivial. It has been clear for years that the NPT is under stress, so alarmism is unnecessary. States-parties are disappointed with the treaty for diverging reasons. What is needed for the review conference in May is pragmatic expectations and constructive multilateralism. The cynical negotiating tactics by a few states-parties in 2005 must not be repeated.
The success of the review conference will depend not only on the substance of the agreements reached there, but also on the way in which those agreements are reached.
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Will Canada go the non-proliferation distance?
Embassy
by Douglas Roche, O.C.
April 14, 2010
US President Barack Obama dramatized world attention on nuclear dangers during his extraordinary 47-nation Washington summit this week by warning that just an apple-sized container of plutonium could set off a nuclear bomb that "could kill and injure hundreds of thousands of innocent people." A "catastrophe for the world" is waiting to happen, he said.
...But since there is enough nuclear fuel in dozens of nations to make another 120,000 nuclear boms, the question can rightly be asked: Did the Obama summit do enough to protect people from an impending catastrophe?
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President Obama Is on the Right Track
National Journal National Security Blog
by David Krieger
April 12, 2010
President Obama is on the right track with his multiple efforts to reduce nuclear dangers. I only wish that it were a faster track and reflected a greater sense of urgency. His policies take account of some important current realities: The Cold War has ended (20 years ago); the greatest threat confronting the US and the world is no longer all-out nuclear war, but nuclear proliferation and nuclear-armed terrorists; and the United States has obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty to engage in “good faith” negotiations to achieve total nuclear disarmament.
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Japan needs to loosen the US nuclear leash
Asahi Shimbun
Hiromichi Umebayashi
April 20, 2010
The greatest achievement of the investigation into "secret pacts" between Japan and the United States was a clear recognition that there was indeed a tacit agreement between the two governments concerning the introduction of nuclear weapons to Japan and that the Japanese government had been lying to the public about it for decades....
As negotiations advance, Japan is sure to face the obstacle of the U.S. government's policy of neither confirming or denying the presence of nuclear weapons in specific situations. However, there is ample room for negotiations on this point.
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New nuclear weapons treaty promises a durable 'Prague Spring'
Edmonton Journal
by Jayantha Dhanapala
April 2, 2010
The long-awaited and successful conclusion last week of the nuclear arms control treaty negotiations between the United States and the Russian Federation -- which together control 95 per cent of the nuclear weapons in the world -- must surely be welcomed…It is a return to traditional arms control (replacing the 1991 treaty signed by presidents George H.W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev) with a seriously negotiated three-tiered treaty, and not by a perfunctory "handshake" as preferred by the previous U.S. administration ...
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Nuclear Non-proliferation and disarmament: Shifting the mindset
Global Research
by David Krieger
March 30, 2010
Throughout the Nuclear Age, leaders of the United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France and China – the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, known as the P5 – have been locked in old ways of thinking about security. They believe that nuclear deterrence in a two-tier structure of nuclear haves and have-nots can hold indefinitely without significant nuclear proliferation and further use of nuclear weapons. This way of thinking continues to place not only the P5 and their allies in danger of nuclear annihilation, but threatens global catastrophe for civilization, the human species and most forms of life…
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More Talk-- and Maybe Action -- on Nuclear Weapons in May
World Bulletin
by Jim Wurst
March 31, 2010
Could 2010 finally be the year for a breakthrough in the world’s most intractable arms control problem: the elimination of nuclear weapons? There have certainly been important positive developments, most notably willingness by the United States to re-engage in multilateral diplomacy and to entertain the idea of a world free of nuclear weapons as a realistic – rather than rhetorical – goal.
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Stand up and speak out for what's right
Edmonton Journal
by Douglas Roche
March 24, 2010
So the Grant MacEwan swimming pool won't be closed, after all. Well, not at least for another year. And the words of the national anthem won't be changed. And the Canadian government's foreign aid programs will continue to include the teaching of family planning.
What binds these disparate topics? Each shows the power of protest. When the public gets mad, politicians (my definition of the word includes university presidents) back down. When the kitchen gets too hot, they run outside gasping for fresh air.
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Japan and NATO Are Ready for the US to Reduce Nuclear Weapons
Huffington Post
by Alyn Ware
February 18, 2010
It has been nearly a year since President Obama's now famous Prague speech, announcing America's commitment to a nuclear weapons-free future. A key test of that commitment is at hand: the current U. S. Nuclear Posture Review. The Obama administration might use it to announce a plan for a deeper reduction in nuclear stockpiles, a shift in nuclear policy to "sole purpose" (i.e., retaining nuclear weapons solely for purposes of deterring others from using such weapons) and begin the process of phasing out nuclear deterrence itself.
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Harper government missing on non-proliferation
Embassy
by Douglas Roche and Ernie Regehr
February 3, 2010
High-ranking officials of the US State Department, NATO and the United Nations were in Ottawa last week to meet with the leaders of five national nuclear disarmament groups and experienced civil society leaders. It was all designed to move the Canadian government to actively support US President Barack Obama's commitment to a nuclear weapons-free world.
Did it? Time will tell and we want to remain optimistic.
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Heeding the warning of bioterrorism
The Hill
by Barry Kellman
January 25, 2010
The warning is clear: Bioterrorism is a serious danger to the United States, says the Report Card Grading Government on Protecting the United States, released Tuesday by the congressionally-mandated commission charged with assessing threats of weapons of mass destruction. We are unprepared for a catastrophic bio-attack, and the rest of the world is in far worse shape.
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