 and welcome to Cooper Union, what's happening with human rights around the world. Today we're looking at nuclear weapons free world for all global abolition movement for peace. It's an honor to be with you all today, especially as we're here on this historic start of the new year. We're here today with two activists and advocates who have worked on this important issue. But before we get to Alan and Jackie, I want to read a quote from Desmond Tutu, unfortunately who just passed on that issue of nuclear abolition. He said, nuclear abolition is the democratic wish of the world's people. And it's been our goal almost since the dawn of the atomic age. Together we have the power to decide whether the nuclear era ends in a bang or a worldwide celebration. And the two people I'm gathered with today have been working very much to make sure that it does end in the most positive way. Alan, Jackie, thank you so much for joining us. Alan, could you share with us a bit on why this nuclear issue is so important and why we should consider it a global New Year's resolution? Aloha, Toshua. Thank you very much. This is an issue which people knew about back in the 1980s and 90s. It was in the media all the time. And the very real existential threat of nuclear weapons was in people's minds. And so people were very active during that time. But complacency has come over the years with people falsely feeling that things are OK because we luckily haven't had a nuclear war. We've had very many close calls. But because we haven't had it, as I said, complacency is set in. But the situation is probably as bad now as it was back during the Cold War. Back then there were two superpowers. And so you sort of had an idea of how things were running between them. Now there are nine countries with nuclear weapons. There are a range of different conflicts that are heating up. There's tensions in the China area, Northeast Asia. There are tensions between Russia and NATO, between Russia and the United States. And nuclear weapons policies are part of these tensions. Many of the nuclear arms states still have nuclear weapons under policies of first use of nuclear weapons with options to use them in a range of circumstances. And Russia and the United States have them on high alert, really defied within minutes on launch on warning. So it's very risky. And we need to pay attention to this, which is why the Bulletin Potomac scientists a year ago reset the doomsday clock to 100 seconds to midnight, indicating this is existential threat of nuclear weapons. They're also referring to the erosion of democracy and climate change. But nuclear weapons and that threat should be up there in people's minds just as climate change is. Thank you so much, Alan. Jackie, could you share with us a bit more about why it's such an important issue for us all at the international but also here in our islands? Sure. Well, as Alan mentioned, fear of nuclear war was very much at the top of the public's attention in the 1980s going into the early 90s. And then what happened? The Cold War ended very suddenly and unexpectedly. And it's almost like the planet breathed a sigh of relief and everybody thought, well, we don't have to worry about nuclear weapons anymore. And it's amazing how quickly it fell off the top of the public's radar screen. Well, I think that from where we sit now, I think it was a misunderstanding by all of us, including myself, that somehow nuclear weapons were an artifact of the Cold War because they weren't. They've turned out to have a life of their own. Nuclear weapons budgets went down for a few years in the United States and it started climbing. Now they're much higher than they've ever been before. We've got every warhead and delivery system being modernized in the United States arsenal. Biden is carrying on from Trump. Trump is carrying on from Obama. Obama is carrying on from Clinton. There's tremendous continuity in US nuclear weapons policy which has from the beginning relied on deterrence, very widely misunderstood to mean the threat of a credible retaliatory second strike, really meaning the threat and use of nuclear weapons. So where we are today, again, Alan alluded to these dangers. There are very, very, very serious tensions between the US and Russia, the US NATO and Russia, the US and China, India and Pakistan, Israel and Iran. And in the case of the US Russia and the US China, there's a war of words which we've been hearing. The worst rhetoric we've heard for decades, the most sabrelling rhetoric we've heard for decades, coupled with these modernization programs, coupled with military exercises and drills, including simulated nuclear drills, coupled with close calls between the military forces of these very states, between ships and planes and so on. And where Hawaii is located, I guess you're closer to the Asia Pacific theater, but there have been all kinds of really awful, scary close calls between and flights by US nuclear capable bombers over contested islands that China claims ownership of and things like that. So people need, should be, I don't like to fear monger or mobilize people through fear, but people really need to wake up and be afraid because it's very real. And people in Hawaii know that as well as anybody because a couple of years ago you had that scare where people had no way of knowing if it was a real incoming missile or some kind of a mistake. And I've talked to people who were there and it was a life-changing experience for them. And we all need to be in that mindset. It's true, just in 2018, in January of 2018, that morning, most of us remember that. And the sad part is we have to then remember that moment and then put it into a movement to then re-mobilize what had been very strong with the largest protest ever in the history of the world. But I really thought Alan did a great job talking about as it is an existential threat. In a way, it's the movie that just came out of Look Up might be another way that we know it's there and what we should do to then take small steps on a daily basis to then lower the temperature and move towards abolition. But as you said, Jackie, it does seem that the weapons, of course, have a life of their own. And of course, if we connect the issues as Alan did, it's very much can be brought up with a decolonization, a decarbonization. Military is very large in the carbon game, bringing so much in. So it's looking at a demilitarization and shifting as we're still in this pandemic to the way that we want to live. Alan, would you like to add anything on that? Yeah, I think you've picked up a couple of key points there. On the militarization, there are vested interests in the nuclear arms race. These are the corporations that are manufacturing the nuclear weapons. And they make sure that they lobby to keep these nuclear weapons programs alive. So the United States is the worst. The majority of the public corporations that are manufacturing the nuclear weapons are United States. There are some others. There's British, there's French, there's Dutch, there's Indian. But the majority of them are the US. And the majority of the money that's going into the nuclear arms race is US taxpayers' money. That's given to these weapons corporations by congressional members who are lobbied by this. So that part of it is one of the reasons why this is continuing. And because the United States is leading on this, it's sort of others follow with knee-jerk reactions in a sense. The Russians want to keep up. The Chinese want to keep up. It's a little similar in the UK. There's a big defense industry in the United Kingdom also that is thwarting the political process. So that's one of the elements of this. But it's not the only element. Nuclear weapons are also a way of pursuing power and pursuing dominance. And that is also of interest to those who want to maintain power. And along with the capacity to annihilate your enemies, it comes this idea that you can come more powerful and you can sell it to the people. It's, you are the one who's going to protect their interests. And you are the one who's going to keep America strong or India strong or the United Kingdom strong. And this plays out in the public media where there is a lack of understanding that these are weapons of mass annihilation. This is a really dangerous game to think about playing power politics by threatening to destroy innocent people, to destroy civilization itself. And so we need to challenge this in the media. We need to challenge this idea that nuclear deterrence is something which provides security. It doesn't. It's something which increases insecurity. It's raising the level of tensions. It's making it more likely that we're going to flip into conflicts, into armed conflicts, and into nuclear war. And we need to educate people about that because they have been fed lies by those who are maintaining that nuclear weapons provide security and provide jobs. Really good point. Jackie? Yeah, I want to elaborate on that a little bit. In the United States, nuclear weapons have been sold to the public as a means of maintaining our national security. And so the drumbeat of that day after day after day, year after year after that, well, national security is worth any price, right? So when we have the biggest budget debate in this generation recently over the so-called Build Back Better bill, nobody, not even the most progressive members of Congress, suggested for one second that any of that, the military budget should be cut and redirected to meeting human needs, Build Back Better budget. And so people have been brainwashed into this national security at any price. As Alan said, they make us less secure, not more secure. But the whole concept of national security is very closely related to the concept of nationalism, which is another factor driving these very, very dangerous new arms races and saber-rattling now. And so I think what our job is to get back to talking about what security really means and what human security needs and the requirements for human security and ecological security and equity and all of those things cannot be met with nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons harm all of them. And I think we need to really get back to basics and we need to make connections with people who are concerned about other issues on that level, not just, we can't just pluck nuclear weapons out of the equation and we'll work that way. We need a massive movement to have a political power to make changes on any of these crises that we're facing. And we need to redefine what security means in the minds of ordinary people in order to build that power, I think. That's a great point. It reminds of where we met there in Tahiti and they're bringing up the issue of decolonization, pointing out that indigenous peoples would never be doing these tests because, of course, they know the impact on the ancestors and on their sacred grounds. This also brings up why we're meeting today on January 4th. Today would have been the start of the Nuclear Nonproforation Treaty discussions because we know it came into effect in 1970 and it was that promise of creating a nuclear weapons-free world. And what was really important, of course, is that this diplomat would be convening now on the UN, so a whole government's accountable to fulfill the treaty's promise. And we, of course, would point out how we can afford to fail. And the other important point is there's close to $100 billion of public funds are spent annually on nuclear weapons. As you were pointing out, Jackie and Alna, the expense of urgent human needs and investment in common security. So what should be the message when they do start that meeting that should have opened today later in the year? Alan? Yeah, well, I say we don't wait until the meeting opens. We need to be talking to the nuclear arms states, the allied countries who are supporting them in their nuclear policies and also to the non-nuclear states to give them more strength, to take forward the message now that the nuclear armed and allied states have to step back from the brink of nuclear war. They have to put more emphasis on diplomacy to resolve these conflicts, not increasing the threat spiral. They need to shift the resources from the nuclear arms race, which is an incredible waste of resources. It's worse than a waste with sinking resources into a very negative and threatening cycle and putting those resources into renewable energy and climate protection and also building back jobs for the disadvantaged communities. You talked about colonialism as part of the problem of the nuclear weapons. And that's only one part of it, that many of the nuclear tests were undertaken in indigenous peoples' lands, whether it was the indigenous peoples in the United States, the indigenous peoples in Kazakhstan or in the Pacific. And this was, again, another form of dominance of those with the nuclear weapons, deciding the two dangerous for us to test them close to us, we will test them in these other places and we can do that because we're powerful. But that's only one part of this dominant structure of nuclear weapons. The other part is that the spending the weapons, spending the money on these corporations, making these corporations very rich in the process and it's taking resources away from poverty. It's taking resources away from sustainable jobs and so poor and disadvantaged are being affected as well. And that's why building coalitions and cooperation, not just with the climate communities, but also with the poverty campaigns. And Jackie can talk a little bit more about that. It's really important. The nuclear weapons is not a standalone issue. They are about dominance of the powerful over the disadvantaged and it plays out in many different ways. And we don't wait. We're not waiting until August, which is when the Nonproliferation Treaty meeting will take place. We are talking and calling on the nuclear arms states and the allied states to change now. Thank you, Jackie. Maybe you could talk about that moral budget and other aspects that Alan was alluded to. Sure. There are more things to be said about the Nonproliferation Treaty. However, do you mind if I go there first? The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty was a deal that was made. It was brokered by the original nuclear arms states, the US, the UK and the Soviet Union because they were afraid more countries are gonna get nuclear weapons. So they made this deal. And they said to these, they said, we'll promise to get rid of our nuclear weapons if you other countries promise not to acquire them. And that was the basis for what became the biggest number of countries on any so-called security treaty. It's almost every country in the world. And all of them, except for the five original nuclear arms states have first worn nuclear weapons. It had two parts though. There was a third part I'll throw that into, which is that in exchange for giving up nuclear weapons will promise you an inalienable right to peaceful nuclear use as well. That's a whole other problem. But in Article VI of the treaty, the nuclear arms states promised to end the arms race at an early date. That was 1970. And to negotiate in good faith the elimination of their nuclear arsenals. That was 1970. It's 2022 now. There are review conferences every five years. In 1995, and it was reviewed and extended indefinitely in 2000 and in 2010, they made additional commitments to an unequivocal undertaking to the elimination of nuclear arms. And many, many, many detailed promises, almost all of which have been ignored or violated. So the message from us, from civil society, from global civil society and from countries that don't have nuclear weapons is we demand that you make good on those promises because they're starting to talk about, well, those things were made under different conditions and they don't apply anymore and so on and so forth. Well, if you believe in the rule of law and international law, then promises must be kept. And so I think at this point, what we're saying is keep your promises. Furthermore, we insist upon a timeline for those promises. And we want you to come back in 2025 with a timeline. This is essentially the logic that abolition in 2000 came up with in 1995 at the review and extension conference when we were demanding that countries commit to negotiate the elimination of nuclear weapons and to come up with a plan with a time-bound framework by the year 2000. And then when that didn't happen, we enrolled 2,000 organizations so we could keep our name and keep going. But right back in that place again, only external conditions are much worse and more dangerous in the world. So regarding India. No, that's a really good point. And I liked also to bring the two points together. Alan was sharing also how really organizing a grand coalition for the common good and linking up indigenous rights, human rights, focusing specifically on climate justice and then also a really renewed peace movement. That really brings up something that we see happening in Geneva a lot. We see the Marshall Islands, of course, who endured 66 tests at the hands of the United States and the jelly babies and all the consequences that develop from that, but we see the Marshall Islands connecting human rights and peace in a good way. Also Alan, another good point that's coming up, you might wanna share is the International Human Rights Committee at the UN that focuses on the Covenant on International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. There's two reviews coming up that'll start 28th February and the Russian Federation and Israel will both be reviewed. Maybe you could share a little bit about how creative human rights advocates are to bring the issue up through the Human Rights Committee because we know you did amazing work with the International Court of Justice earlier when you were organizing from Al Tadduap. Thanks Joshua and Jackie already sort of started the conversation on the application of law and saying that keeping agreements is an important policy and principle in international law and the nuclear arms states are not keeping to their agreement that they made in 1970 to bring an early end to the nuclear arms race and to achieve a nuclear weapons free world. So that's one aspect of the law that's applicable to nuclear weapons, the NPT agreement. But there's more than that. As you mentioned in 1996, the International Court of Justice considered a case and advisory opinion on the legality of the threat or use of nuclear weapons under the laws of warfare, international humanitarian law, what you're allowed to do and what you're not allowed to do once you're in armed conflict and the law of peace and security, like when you're allowed to use force itself. And they came up saying that the threat or use of nuclear weapons would generally be prohibited under international law. That is applicable to all states regardless of which treaty or not they've joined, this law is applicable to everyone and there's an obligation to achieve nuclear disown. That's under international humanitarian law and the law of peace and security. This was strengthened even further by the UN Human Rights Committee in 2018, which was looking at the right to life, Article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which all of the countries in the world are parties to, the sort of exception is China which is signed but not ratified, but they're still in the treaty. And the UN Human Rights Committee in 2018 said, the threat or use of nuclear weapons also violates the right to life. And then it reaffirmed the obligation to eliminate nuclear weapons and also to have responsibility for the impact of the production and testing of nuclear weapons. So what does this do? It actually highlights that this is not just an issue of like what you're allowed to do and allowed to do in wartime. It's not just an issue of threat or use of force. It's a human rights issue. And in that human rights issue, it brings us in much closer cooperation, the peace and disarmament communities with the human rights communities. And we're already doing that by doing challenges to nuclear armed and allied states when it comes up for their review under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and some of the other human rights treaties. So it was a really good approach to be able to build more cooperation between the peace, disarmament and human rights communities. It is. So I'm glad under Article 6 on the right to life, we can bring that up when Russia is reviewed in a little over over a month and then also even put pressure on Israel. And there's also a lot that we can do locally. I know Jackie, the last time we were together, Honolulu was hosting the mayor's conference for the United States and you were working on a lot of issues. I know one action right now is there's support for an appeal for a treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons also known as the TPNW where cities can call for national governments to sign and ratify it. And there's so far three cities, Boston, New York and Minneapolis. That's one way that people can get involved to call their mayors in Kauai and Honolulu as well as Maui and Hawaii Island. What other actions can we do locally and aspects that you're doing bringing those issues from the international down to the island and to the communities? Okay, well, let's take a step more broadly. I'm the North American coordinator of mayors for peace. Mayor's for peace was founded in 1982 at the UN second special session on disarmament by the mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and has grown to now over 8,000 cities in 165 countries. And one thing, we only have 220 US members, however. And one thing people can do is recruit their mayors to become members. And that's something that Hiroshima would appreciate a great deal. In the US, and the reason I was at that US Conference of Mayors meeting is because mayors for peace, US members have introduced resolutions that have been adopted unanimously for 16 consecutive years calling for the elimination of nuclear weapons and calling for very specific measures to make that happen. And linking with other issues such as military spending such as the global pandemic and so on. These are, if these resolutions were enacted by the US Congress nuclear weapons would be done. That's how strong these resolutions are. And they need to be known better. But I would say, so get your mayor to join Mayor's for peace if he or she is not already member. There are several in Hawaii. The appeal you were talking about is called the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons Cities Appeal that's on the ICANN website. There's also the back from the BRINC campaign which has been endorsed by the US Conference of Mayors on several occasions, which calls for immediate commencement negotiations led by the United States of the nuclear arms states to eliminate their nuclear weapons and several other measures, including cutting, eliminating funding from modernization programs, taking away the sole authority of a US president to initiate nuclear war and calling for a declaration of declaratory policy of no first use. And I believe that something like 357 cities in the US have adopted back from the BRINC resolutions, sometimes twinning them with the city's appeal resolution. Over 300 local elected officials, mayors and state legislatures recently sent a letter to Biden making those same demands. And so those are very good resources for people to use. And I have a kind of a mayor-sur-peace toolkit that encompasses all of those things. I don't know how to make it available to your viewers, but I can provide the link. Sure, we can definitely share that going forward. And I really do want to thank... Joshua, I suggest that also that as well as your mayors, you can also engage your federal legislators. And so I'm the global coordinator of parliamentarians for nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament. And that is the federal legislators. And we cooperate with mayors-sur-peace on many joint statements and things. In the US, we're led by Senator Ed Markey, who's got a number of initiatives in the Senate, the ICBM Act, which is Invest in Cures Before Missiles, the SAIN Act, Smart Approach to Nuclear Expenditure, which is with slashing the funding and nuclear weapons and others also. And there's also a number of initiatives in the House. And one of those is also that also the United States should be never to launch a nuclear war to be no first use. So also working with your federal legislators is an important action that people can take. Yes, Alan, and thank you so much, because we know PNND is a very important instrument, really, for that level at the National to make sure that governments actually adopt a peaceful approach to their foreign policy. So thank you so much for that. I know we're at our time. And I really want to thank you both for appearing here when there should have been the opening of the discussion, because it really is one of the widest adherents of any arms control agreement that's ever been adopted. And what is really important, of course, as we gather, is to think about the future, a peaceful future with human rights for all. And as Jackie pointed out, with equality, but also equity. So thank you so much for starting Cooper Union this year in 2022 and really raising the issue of nuclear abolition and peace for all. So it's not just a slogan during a season, but more importantly, what we all want and desire and how we can move forward at our local level with mayors for peace and also with parliamentarians. Thank you both. Malahia Mekapono. And look forward to a bright future together, beginning with the Human Rights Committee and the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Article 6, next month. Aloha. Aloha.