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UN Office
International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms
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The UN Human Rights Committee recently made a striking finding that nuclear weapons are contrary to the right to life. On December 10, the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, LCNP held an event examining that development, which joins other recent UN initiatives driving towards a world free of nuclear weapons.
Going in quite the opposite direction, the US and Russia have doubled down on reliance on nuclear weapons, and the Trump administration is poised to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. LCNP has joined with other groups to campaign for preservation of the treaty.
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Best wishes for peaceful and enjoyable holidays,
John Burroughs
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The Right to Life Versus Nuclear Weapons
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| Ariana Smith, Peter Weiss, John Burroughs (moderator), and Roger Clark, at a December 10 event on the UN Human Rights Committee's new commentary on nuclear weapons. Video is here. |
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The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights is a major human rights treaty with 172 states parties, including every nuclear-armed state except China. Article 6(1) of the Covenant provides: "Every human being has the inherent right to life. This right shall be protected by law. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life."
On October 30, 2018, the UN Human Rights Committee, a body established by the Covenant, adopted a new
General Comment (no. 36) on the right to life set out in Article 6. The comment contains detailed provisions on such matters as abortion, safeguards on the imposition of the death penalty, enforced disappearance, climate change and unsustainable development (described as "some of the most pressing and serious threats to the ability of present and future generations to enjoy the right to life"), use of force in armed conflict, and aggression, which when resulting in deprivation of life, the committee said, violates the right to life.
What stood out to us is an excellent paragraph, para. 66, on nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. It provides in part:
The threat or use of weapons of mass destruction, in particular nuclear weapons, which are indiscriminate in effect and are of a nature to cause destruction of human life on a catastrophic scale is incompatible with respect for the right to life and may amount to a crime under international law.... [States parties] must also respect their international obligations to pursue in good faith negotiations in order to achieve the aim of nuclear disarmament under strict and effective international control and to afford adequate reparation to victims whose right to life has been or is being adversely affected by the testing or use of weapons of mass destruction, in accordance with principles of international responsibility.
Daniel Rietiker of Swiss Lawyers for Nuclear Disarmament and
John Burroughs of LCNP made two submissions in the process leading to adoption of the General Comment, as Rietiker explains in this
assessment of the comment. We will publicize its para. 66 vigorously. It will build bridges between human rights advocates and disarmament advocates, and embeds disarmament within an elaborate human rights machinery applicable to most states. The comment also parallels and complements the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (not yet entered into force), and the UN Secretary-General's disarmament agenda,
Securing Our Common Future.
At a December 10 event sponsored by LCNP and the Sorensen Center for International Peace and Justice, CUNY School of Law, Rutgers law professor and LCNP advisor
Roger Clark gave a highly informative overview of the Human Rights Committee's commentary on nuclear weapons. CUNY law student and LCNP intern
Ariana Smith insightfully discussed the committee's finding that "threat" of nuclear arms violates the right to life. LCNP President Emeritus
Peter Weiss, a pioneering human rights lawyer, provided thought-provoking reflections on the place of the committee's commentary in the development of international law. Their remarks are well worth reading, and you can also watch the
video. For additional analysis, see this
piece by Alyn Ware.
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Nuclear Arms Control Under Siege
On October 20, President Trump announced an intent to withdraw from the INF Treaty, a key bilateral nuclear arms control agreement with Russia. LCNP and Western States Legal Foundation, an IALANA affiliate, helped develop a RootsAction led online
campaign enabling constituents to contact their representative and senators to urge action to save the treaty. LCNP Executive Director John Burroughs explained the initiative in this Institute for Public Accuracy
media alert. The campaign is still active - please
participate!
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"Soldiers against an Euroshima, No New Nuke Missiles" banner in march of about 200,000 people in Hamburg, Germany against Pershing II missile deployment, October 22, 1983. The missiles were later banned by the INF Treaty. AP photo.
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In this effort we have drawn on work Peter Weiss and Burroughs did in representing over 30 members of the House of Representatives in a federal lawsuit challenging the GW Bush administration's withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002. The case was dismissed on procedural grounds, but it sent a signal that there is a powerful constitutional argument that Congress should have a role in decision-making about treaty termination, as former senator Russell Feingold has
explained.
That is just as true today as it was in 2002, as is recognized by many in Congress. The likely incoming chairs of the House Armed Services Committee (Adam Smith) and Foreign Affairs Committee (Eliot Engel) signed a
letter complaining bitterly that their committees had not been consulted about the plan to withdraw. Senators Merkley, Warren, Gillibrand, Markey, Wyden, Sanders, and Feinstein have introduced the
Prevention of Arms Race Act of 2018 (S.3667). It erects several high barriers to spending on production of INF Treaty-violative missiles and declares a sense of the Senate that "
President Trump's announcement of the intent of the United States to withdraw from the INF Treaty, without proper consultation with Congress, is a serious breach of Congress's proper constitutional role as a co-equal branch of government."
It is important to preserve the INF Treaty and to extend or revise New START, which limits long-range nuclear forces and expires in 2021, so that an arms control structure remains in place between the US and Russia. But it is also imperative to go beyond these instruments, which allow possession of arsenals capable of destroying entire societies, to create a process for going to global zero.
The larger picture is well described in an October
statement by
Jacqueline Cabasso to the First Committee (Disarmament and Security) of the UN General Assembly. Cabasso is Executive Director of Western States Legal Foundation and an LCNP advisor. LCNP contributed to the statement. She told the committee:
"T
he United States has introduced a proposal called 'Creating the Conditions for Nuclear Disarmament' ('the CCND approach'), arguing that unspecified conditions must be met in order for the international security environment to improve before disarmament can take place. But the US has it backwards. We advocate an approach we're calling 'Creating the Conditions for International Peace and Human Security' (the CCIPHS approach), which envisions real progress on nuclear disarmament as contributing to international peace and human security.
" The statement addresses US-Russian nuclear arms racing, the need to implement the multilateral agreement limiting Iran's nuclear program despite US violation of the agreement, and the potential for a solution linking peace, development and disarmament on the Korean Peninsula.
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