The United Nations’ secretary general, António Guterres, on Monday, 1 August, warned that humanity is just a misunderstanding away from “nuclear annihilation.”
Guterres spoke at the opening of a key nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) conference in New York to review the landmark 50-year-old treaty aimed at preventing the spread of nuclear weapons and achieving a nuclear-free world.
Posting a video, he said in a tweet, “Today, humanity is just one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear annihilation.”
He added, “The Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons is an opportunity to agree on the measures that will help avoid certain disaster.”
This comes amid the United States, United Kingdom, and France’s attempt to urge Russia to stop “its dangerous nuclear rhetoric and behaviour," AFP reported.
Guterres said that the world faced “a nuclear danger not seen since the height of the cold war.”
'Future Generations Are Counting On Your Commitment'
Citing Russia’s war with Ukraine and tensions on the Korean peninsula and in the Middle East, Guterres said he feared that crises that has had “nuclear undertones” so far could escalate.
Guterres called on conference participants to take actions:
urgently reinforce and reaffirm “the 77-year-old norm against the use of nuclear weapons”
work relentlessly toward eliminating nuclear weapons with new commitments to reduce arsenals
address “the simmering tensions in the Middle Est and Asia”
promote the peaceful use of nuclear technology
“Future generations are counting on your commitment to step back from the abyss...This is our moment to meet this fundamental test and lift the cloud of nuclear annihilation once and for all,” Guterres was quoted as saying by AP.
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