Turkey stresses need for nuclear disarmament

Turkey’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations in Vienna Birnur Fertekligil called on the five permanent members of the UN Security Council to uphold their responsibility towards nuclear disarmament, the Anadolu Agency reported.

Speaking during the 3rd international Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons, Fertekligil said that Turkey believes nuclear weapons are a major threat, stressing the need for a comprehensive approach to solving the problem of those weapons.

She said: “We are still living with the stark truth that nuclear weapons exist and there is a considerable possibility that they will spread and there is no doubt that these weapons may fall into the hands of unauthorised actors including terrorists, and this is alarming. Therefore, full and irreversible nuclear disarmament is naturally the answer.”

Fertekligil stressed the need to have practical international cooperation for complete nuclear disarmament, adding: “It is through cooperation and solidarity between countries that we can mitigate the risks of these weapons”.

The participants in the conference discussed the consequences and humanitarian aspects arising from the possibility of a nuclear explosion, the impact of nuclear testing, the growing international concern, the difficulty of controlling the consequences of the misuse of nuclear weapons, the risks of deliberate or unintended use and the disastrous effects of the occurrence of nuclear scenarios.

For the first time, the conference was attended by two of the five permanent members of the Security Council; United States and Britain, while France, China and Russia abstained.