Lessons from nuclear disarmament show us a pathway to a Fossil Fuel Treaty

Three years ago, on 7 July 2017, something quite remarkable happened. After decades of trying to get the nuclear powers to fulfil their commitments under the 1968 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), a bold group of countries including Costa Rica, New Zealand, Mexico, Ireland and South Africa, with the backing of a massive civil society campaign, decided to bypass the obstruction of the nuclear powers and create a new treaty to ban nuclear weapons.

It was the result of a global mobilisation under the umbrella of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), a coalition of more than 500 partner organisations in over 100 countries, including Scientists for Global Responsibility in the UK.

The approach of ICAN, which has an international steering group and a small staff in Geneva, was to use the new treaty to ‘stigmatise, prohibit and finally eliminate’ nuclear weapons. Timmon Wallis, from NucleanBan.us, who was involved in the treaty negotiations, described the joy he felt at for once being the one inside the UN building negotiating a treaty, while US and other big powers were outside protesting against it.

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