63 years have passed since the nuclear bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which must be remembered for the excruciating human agony and devastating destruction of a kind never seen before. The “Global Voyage for a Nuclear-Free World – Peace Boat Hibakusha Project” has brought 102 Hibakusha (survivors of the atomic bombings) to Piraeus, Greece as part of the worldwide voyage to share their testimonies and the universal message of the Hibakusha that nuclear weapons must be abolished in order to never again allow their use. To this end, we join the global civil society call for a world free from nuclear weapons, underpinned by a Nuclear Weapons Convention.

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“How close we came to extinction, and it is forgotten now.” So begins Nobel Prize-winner Bernard Lown’s story of his fight against the nuclear symptom of what he calls “the disease of militarism.” It is still active and highly contagious, as witnessed by events in Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, and all too many other places. And it can only be stopped, as this extraordinary memoir vividly demonstrates, by concerned citizens working together.

more ...[Flyer of the book]

The US-India Deal Working Group of the international disarmament network, ABOLITION 2000,  in which IPPNW is involved, deplores the decision of the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) to approve a special exemption for India from its nuclear trade rules.
The exemption will allow India to participate in international nuclear trade, but, contrary to the claims of its advocates, it will not bring India further into conformity with the nonproliferation behavior expected of the member states of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

more ...[Letter to Ambassador Lüdeking, January 2008]  [Letter to Minister Steinmeier, August 2008]

I am happy to be here at the inauguration of the 18th World Congress of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War. The pioneering work of the organisation and its efforts for peace, health and development need no mention here; it has been awarded the Noble Peace Prize. Conferences of this nature help in better understanding of the causes of armed conflict, especially from a public health perspective, and build grassroots awareness of the immense health and environment consequences of nuclear war.

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At a press conference in Hiroshima, Japan, Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba announced that the 2020 Vision Campaign of Mayors for Peace is successful in preparing for the Decisive Decade for Nuclear Disarmament. Mayor Akiba, also President of Mayors for Peace, declared, "An ambitious membership drive which begun last January has come to fruition: we now have 2,028 Mayors in 127 countries rallying for the 2020 Vision!". Over 400 new members joined Mayors for Peace during 2007.

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ICAN-UK is a new consortium of groups facilitated by Medact as the UK affiliate of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War. ICAN´s aim is to draw attention to the feasibility of nuclear abolition through the model treaty outlined in Securing our Survival, the Case for a Nuclear Weapons Convention (NWC), and to generate political will for nuclear disarmament through educating and engaging the public and policy makers.

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On Sunday the 18th of November the Mayor of Hiroshima Hadatoshi Akiba visited Stockholm, Sweden. For his visit Swedish students in IPPNW arranged the first "Nuclear Weapon Free - my cup of tea" event. This is a new activity that can be done all over the world in IPPNW as a contribution to the ICAN campaign. There are still 27.000 nuclear weapons in the world. The purpose of each and every one of them is their potential of causing a major disaster. But in fact, they are causing disaster every day.

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From September 28th-30th of 2007, a group of more than 30 medical students, doctors and political activists cycled the English countryside from Dover to London in order to reach this conference, informing the public on their way about the dangers of nuclear weapons, holding Target X installations and meeting with mayors and media on the way. Background of the tour was the decision of the British parliament to renew the Trident nuclear weapons program for an estimated cost of £25 billion.

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Even a limited, regional nuclear war, such as an exchange between India and Pakistan, would cause world wide climate disruption and lead to global famine. This was one outcome of the international conference "Nuclear Weapons: The Final Pandemic -Preventing Proliferation and Achieving Abolition" of IPPNW in partnership with the Royal Society of Medicine. Dr Helfand and Professor Alan Robock and Dr Owen Toon, demonstrated that debris ejected into the atmosphere from the nuclear explosions and subsequent fires would cause sudden global cooling and decreased precipitation for up to 10 years.

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In Rhodes was created a new terenean Antinuclear link named Mediterranean No Nuclear Neighbourhood (MN³). In the Secretariat Maria Arvaniti Sotiropoulou was elected representing the Greek Affiliate of IPPNW. Following you find the declaration of MN³. "We, the Organizations from 9 countries of the wider area of the Mediterranean gathered in Rhodes, September 27-29 2007, and signed the Protocol of Cooperation for the Creation of the Mediterranean No Nuclear Neighbourhood, address the citizens of our countries with a hopeful dream..."

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The German affiliate of IPPNW has signed a letter from the global network "Abolition 2000" asking member states of the Nuclear Suppliers Group to veto the proposed US-India nuclear deal. The signatories of the letter view the deal as "deeply flawed" and regard the consequences for the internation non-proliferation regime to be so severe, that only the next Review Conference of the Non-Proliferation Treaty should take a decision on it.

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More than 60 years ago, the world was put on notice by the US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that we were living on borrowed time. More than 40 years ago, physicians and scientists described in frightening and comprehensive terms how a nuclear war would kill tens of millions of people indiscriminately, destroy entire societies and ecosystems, and cause cancers and genetic damage in unborn generations. In time we learned that, at its worst extreme, a nuclear exchange involving thousands of warheads could cause a nuclear winter that would lead to the extinction of humankind.

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On the 6th of August 2007 at the anniversary of Hiroshima massacre Derman Boztok (general secretary and international councilor of NUSED) and his colleague Dr. Mehmet Kum (deputy health director and president of locally active NGO) declared to press the Igdir Appeal of NUSED and several local NGOs of Igdir Province (the most eastern province) condemning the use and development of nuclear weapons, reminding IPPNW´s ICAN efforts globally and pointing out the very imminent threat posed locally by the Metsamor nuclear plant at the Armenian border.

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The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was founded on July 29th, 1957. On the occasion of this 50th anniversary IPPNW-Germany has created an electronic birthday card to the IAEA that criticizes the agency's role in promoting so-called peaceful uses of nuclear energy. The e-card can be viewed, personalized, and signed at www.iaea.ippnw.de. According to its founding statute, the aim of the IAEA is to prevent nuclear weapons proliferation while, at the same time, enlarging the peaceful use of nuclear energy. IPPNW believes that this is a self-contradictory mission.

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SLMK - the Swedish affiliate of IPPNW sent a delegation of 3 students and 1 doctor to Pyongyang, Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). The delegation aimed at strengthening the relationship with the DPRK affiliate of IPPNW, spreading awareness on nuclear weapon issues to medical students and doctors, increasing our knowledge about the health care situation in DPRK.

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On April 30 ICAN was launched at the Vienna nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) meeting, along with the book Securing our Survival (SOS): the Case for a Nuclear Weapons Convention with a panel featuring Mayor Akiba of Hiroshima, Dr. Ron McCoy of IPPNW, Dr. Carlos Vargas of Costa Rica, as well as co-authors of the Nuclear Weapons Convention, Alyn Ware, Jurgen Scheffran and Felicity Hill.

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Upon invitation of the Swiss chapter of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, an international conference on the topic of "Nuclearisation in Europe and the Middle East" took place on Monte Verità, Ascona, Switzerland from March 22nd to 25th 2007. In a time of high international tension in the Middle East, participants focused on the absolute necessity for high-level constructive dialogue between all the parties. Respect for mutual fears as well as the overcoming of misunderstandings due to cultural and historical differences should inherently be part of such dialogue.

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On Tuesday, April 17, 2007 you killed a man who was apparently an obstacle to your criminal enterprises. We wonder if you have any idea what you have taken from the world. Mayor Iccho Itoh was born only two weeks before the atomic bombing of Nagasaki by the United States on August 9, 1945. Defined by that monstrous act of war along with the other hibakusha of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, Mayor Itoh devoted his life to making sure that nuclear weapons would never be used again. Without rancor or ill will, he quietly and persistently went about the business of campaigning for the elimination of nuclear weapons from the world.

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Medact doctors join others at the Faslane submarine base in Scotland to protest against new nuclear weapons. Dr Trevor Trueman said: "The proposed replacement of Trident, when we have ratified a non-proliferation Treaty and are encouraging other countries to remain non-nuclear, is the height of hypocrisy. Nuclear weapons are indiscriminate and therefore illegal under international law."

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Nuclear weapons today present tremendous dangers, but also an historic opportunity. U.S. leadership will be required to take the world to the next stage -- to a solid consensus for reversing reliance on nuclear weapons globally as a vital contribution to preventing their proliferation into potentially dangerous hands, and ultimately ending them as a threat to the world. Nuclear weapons were essential to maintaining international security during the Cold War because they were a means of deterrence. The end of the Cold War made the doctrine of mutual Soviet-American deterrence obsolete. Deterrence continues to be a relevant consideration for many states with regard to threats from other states. But reliance on nuclear weapons for this purpose is becoming increasingly hazardous and decreasingly effective.

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The Co-Presidents of IPPNW issued a statement today condemning the nuclear test by North Korea. "The test explosion of a nuclear weapon, announced today by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, was an irresponsible and dangerous action that can only be seen as a giant step backward for the people of North Korea and for the entire North Asian region" they said. The Co-Presidents strongly urged restraint by all parties.

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Jack Straw Leader of the UK House of Commons announced on Friday 21st July that the House of Commons would vote on the issue of maintaining the Trident Missile System before the end of the year. The vote will be a 'three line whip vote' meaning MPs are expected to vote with the party leadership rather than with their conscience. Parliament is now in summer recess until October, which implies that the vote will occur in November or December this year.

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The 17th IPPNW World Congress took place in Helsinki, Finland from 7th to 10 September 2006. The motto of the Congress was War or Health? Themes of the congress were: nuclear abolition; small arms and the public health impact of war; and energy security. A statement was issued at the close of the congress.

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Solange Fernex, a French pacifist and politician born in 1934 and resident in Biederthal (Alsace), died of cancer on 11 September at around 3pm. After living through some difficult stages and a recent short remission, she slipped away gently.

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IPPNW physicians and medical students participated in a new round of Dialogues with Decision Makers in Brussels and Moscow this March and April.

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IPPNW played over many, many years the leadership role in advocating testing moratoria, and end to testing, and adoption of a CTBT. IPPNW's "CeaseFire" campaign generated thousands of letters of protest after each nuclear weapons test explosion. As you know, while full scale underground testing has been stopped - at least for now - testing does in fact continue - in the laboratory. The United Kingdom, in conjunction with the US, conducted a subcritical nuclear test at the American underground test site in Nevada on February 23.

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IPPNW condemns unequivocally any use or threatened use of nuclear weapons for any reason. We are therefore appalled at your statement on January 19 that France has reconfigured its nuclear forces in preparation for a tactical nuclear strike against any country that your government concludes had sponsored an act of terrorism against France. IPPNW does not condone terrorism in any form, nor would we deny the right of any government to use legitimate means to defend its people against acts of terrorism. The use of nuclear weapons, however, is not a legitimate means under any circumstances.

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An IPPNW delegation met for two hours with policy staff of the FCO Department of Counter Proliferation and the Ministry of Defence in the UK. The following day, another IPPNW delegation visited the Ministry of Defense and the Foreign Office in Paris and talked to officials there.

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On November 17, 2005 the plenary of the EU parliament gathered in Strasbourg adopted a resolution called "European Parliament resolution on non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction: A role for the European Parliament (2005/2139(INI)) " The resolution refers to The World Court opinion on Nuclear Weapons from June 1996, and gives a clear recognition from the Parliament that the governing bodies of the European Union has to integrate this advisory opinion in its strategy on nuclear weapons.

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The IPPNW Board of Directors released the following letter to Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei following his 2005 Nobel Peace Prize: "Congratulations to you personally and all your colleagues at the IAEA who have laboured so hard to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons on our planet. IPPNW also wishes to express particular gratitude for your commitment to preventing the invasion of Iraq. You provided the international community with factual information on the monitoring of Iraq's weapons programmes and took a strong stand against the false allegations made by a few nations. We hope that you can bring the facts to bear on the current crisis over Iran's nuclear intentions and that the call for multilateral solutions will prevail."

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Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) mourns the death of Professor Sir Joseph Rotblat on August 31, in London, UK at the age of 96. Professor Rotblat, a 1995 Nobel Peace Laureate, and one of the first nuclear weapons opponents, was the only scientist to quit the Manhattan Project for moral reasons, when he learned from that Adolf Hitler and Germany were not developing a nuclear weapon. From that point on, he turned his immense talents and energy to nuclear medicine and a life-long campaign against nuclear weapons and war.

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The flame from Hiroshima has now been returned to its place of origin and extinguished. A flame was lit in 1945 from the members of the fires in Hiroshima that the atomic bomb started. The flame has been kept in a temple close to Nagasaki. Every year monks have walked from Hiroshima to Nagasaki, and there walked in circles to symbolize that this should be the last bomb. Now the monks have brought the flame across to California and walked through the desert to the place of the first atomic bomb explosion, called Trinity, near Alamogordo in New Mexico.

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I was privileged to meet Mordechai Vanunu, the dissident anti-nuclear Israeli who was released from 18yrs imprisonment last year for his advocacy on Israel's nuclear weapons, when staying in St George's guest house in Jerusalem in July. Although he is not supposed to meet foreigners or the press he was happy to talk about his views and indeed this is one of the reasons why he is staying in this particular setting.

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The International Atomic Energy Agency, which I will herafter refer to as IAEA, is best known by the general public for its inspections and subsequent discovery of secret nuclear programmes. But little is known about its actual mandate as an organisation and how it plays a significant role in the promotion of the so-called peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

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