Senate approves treaty banning nuclear weapons

February 2 ------ The Senate on Monday adopted a Resolution ratifying the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). With 23 votes, the Senate concurred with Senate Resolution 620 authored principally by Senator Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel III. Pimentel noted that the treaty further reinforces commitments against the use, threat of use, development, production, manufacture, acquisition, possession, stockpiling, transfer, stationing, or installation of nuclear weapons.

Likewise, Pimentel said that the TPNW also provides prohibition on the following acts:

- developing, testing, producing, manufacturing, otherwise acquiring, possessing or stockpiling nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices;

- transfer to any recipient whatsoever nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices or control over such weapons or explosive devices directly or indirectly;

- receiving the transfer of or control over nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices directly or indirectly;

- using or threatening to use nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices;

- assisting, encouraging or inducing, in any way, anyone to engage in any activity prohibited to a State Party under this Treaty;

- seeking or receiving any assistance, in any way, from anyone to engage in any activity prohibited under this Treaty; and

- allowing any stationing, installation or deployment of any nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices in its territory or at any place under its jurisdiction or control.

“The Treaty is the first globally applicable multilateral agreement to comprehensively prohibit nuclear weapons on the basis of international humanitarian law,” Pimentel, a lawyer, argued. Pimentel then cited that the Philippines, along with other 52 countries, is among the first states to sign the treaty. “As a signatory to the Treaty, the Philippines has much to gain, including the TPNW's provisions on victim assistance and environmental remediation,” he said. He then cited environmental research that warned of a global climate cooling capable of adversely affecting food production for years even with a "limited regional nuclear war."

The same research also warned that a large-scale nuclear war could "create ice-age like conditions that might eliminate most of the human race." "Nuclear weapons do not discriminate. We cannot afford another nuclear arms race. The Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings in Japan are horrors that should never be repeated," Pimentel stressed. Another author of the measure, Senator Risa Hontiveros, agreed by citing that nuclear weapons have "humanitarian and environmental consequences that span decades and cross generations."

"The TPNW is groundbreaking and a step in the direction of creating an international norm of conduct. With 86 nations signing it and 52 so far ratifying it - perhaps we will be the 53rd - the collective voice of humanity is clear: nuclear weapons should be banned forever, as we have banned landmines and biological and chemical weapons," she added.

Source: gmanetwork.com