More than any other people on this planet, the Marshall Islanders are survivors of the two greatest threats facing humanity: nuclear weapons and climate change. Their idyllic archipelago, a sapphire entity between Hawaii and Australia, is located 5,000 miles west of Los Angeles and 500 miles north...

If conflict is inevitable in human relations, so might be efforts to reconcile and reach a state of peace. ...

We know we are facing an existential crisis with the advance of climate change; and what about the other existential threat? Nuclear weapons. Unless we arrest climate change, it will fundamentally change our civilization in a matter of decades, maybe threaten life on this planet. Nuclear weapons...

In the centennial year 2000, while the world was getting used to writing or typing the year beginning with a “2” instead of a “1,” nations were introduced to the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals encouraging the 189 member states to adopt a set of 8 goals for a timeline of 15...

There are many aspects to helping our planet disarm meaningfully. 108 countries are now part of treaties that have established nuclear free zones around the world. They are making a concerted effort to create a nuclear free planet and that alone needs to be applauded and the trend encouraged.

Feel like the system is too big to change? Protest!

An appeal was recently distributed to navy personnel at Bangor Naval Base in Washington State, calling on navy personnel to "Refuse to engage in nuclear annihilation." This appeal is reprinted here with permission of the Ground Zero Center in Seattle, WA.

On April 14, 2019 the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark, NJ hosted a conference on Steps To A Nuclear Weapons-Free World. According to the NJIT coordinator, Jay Kappraff, the purpose of the conference was to focus on the watershed moment we are facing: “Nuclear forces are being...

It is often stated – incorrectly – that the Chinese character for “crisis” includes the symbols for both “danger” and “opportunity.” While that may not be literally correct, the character does mean “a pivotal moment when things happen or change.” The world is at such a juncture...

According to a video and transcript can be found at the State Department’s website. Take a listen. You might be favorably surprised with Dr. Ford’s tone, language, and message. When was the last time you heard anyone in public office, especially at the federal level even mention the word...

It seems time for some more good news. In opening up the homepage from the International Atomic Energy Agency website, the lead article read: “EU and IAEA Review Progress and Agree on Priorities in Nuclear Cooperation at Annual Meeting.” There it was: an actual story of agreement and...

On Feb. 1, the Trump administration announced it will pull the U.S. out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty (INF), thus undoing one of the pillars of global security and potentially plunging the world into a new nuclear arms race.  The 1987 signing of this treaty by U.S. President...

This article originally appeared as the Introduction to a Special issue of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists: Spotlight on nuclear modernization on January 7, 2019, and is republished here with permission.  ...

The Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty and the enterprise of nuclear arms control are at risk, as Andrew Lichterman of Western States Legal Foundation and John Burroughs of Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy explain in this opinion piece from January 2, 2019. Congress has the authority to save the treaty!

The following blog is taken from a talk given by Guy Quinlan to the Harvard Club of New York City in September 2018 on the book by Daniel Ellsberg, The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner, and is reprinted with his kind permission. Please refer to this original document for...

The First Committee of the United Nations is a forum for countries to hold a dialogue on all disarmament-related matters. Where some countries promote disarmament to strengthen security for their population, others oppose disarmament as a threat to the security of their population. Which is correct?

Trump's memorable visit to the United Nations in September 2018 included a conversation at the Security Council about weapons of mass destruction. During that session, many countries highlighted the need for nuclear powers to comply with existing treaties.

At a recent event at the Unitarian Church of All Souls in NYC, Chris King from the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs addressed the need for countries to come together to find a way to reduce nuclear weapons arsenals.

Human beings and nuclear weapons cannot co-exist. I am writing from downtown Nagasaki where I have been attending the 2018 World Conference Against Atom and Hydrogen Bombs. Three days ago, we commemorated the 73rd anniversary of the US atomic bombing of Hiroshima. There, on a hot, clear August...

While there are a range of disarmament treaties that merit discussion, these are some recent ones mentioned in the news, explained here more fully for our readers’ clarification. Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons July 1st of this year marked the 50th anniversary of the 1968...

This blog is in tribute to the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival in commemoration of the Poor People’s March 50 years ago organized by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference under Martin Luther King’s leadership. Learning of the pillars supporting the Poor...

Jerry Ross, UU-UNO Envoy at First Parish in Bedford, MA, reports on his experiences attending nuclear disarmament conferences in New York City.

This week's post in Disarming Our Planet is a statement by Mr Peter Maurer, President of the International Committee of the Red Cross, reposted here from https://www.icrc.org/en/document/nuclear-weapons-averting-global-catast… ICRC's website as an appeal to States, global leaders, and citizens.

How do you ever get the membership of the United Nations to sit down and talk about disarmament and even set off a large enough public response to have a significant downsizing of nuclear arsenals as a result? All we need is another Homer Jack. “And who is he?” you ask. Certainly not a commonly...

Information direct from a UN staffer shows the risks in modern times relating to nuclear weapons, including recent efforts by nuclear-weapons states to modernize and develop new nuclear weapon technologies.

Just as the initiation of recent student led advocacy from Parkland, Florida brings hope for positive change in this country, so too have students in Japan addressed the issue of nuclear disarmament in their country by sharing the stories of nuclear blast survivors.

An overview of the contributions the Holy See made to the negotiations process leading up to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Pope Francis has been outspoken in support of nuclear disarmament.

This edition of Disarming Our World explores the story behind how the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons came to be.

Nuclear disarmament may still be far away, but significant steps are being taken at the United Nations through the leadership of 122 countries who have declared nuclear weapons illegal. The other, nuclear-armed countries must listen and learn from them.

This new series on the UUA International Blog is devoted to building our knowledge of disarmament efforts then and now, with the goal of helping to create a more peaceful world with much fewer weapons. As the UN Charter indicates, there is a real need for security - and provision is needed for some measure of control - but certainly not at this level of military expenditure and ongoing military undertakings.

In October 2016, the United Nations General Assembly voted to begin negotiations on the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. This critically important treaty calls for a complete ban of the use, production, possession, testing, and transfer of nuclear weapons. The legally binding treaty...

The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons is a legally-binding and long overdue treaty to promote nuclear disarmament around the world. This treaty is a critical step toward ensuring that nuclear weapons no longer pose a threat to present and future generations.

Negotiations are underway at the United Nations to ban nuclear weapons. That is a remarkable statement. Last October, the United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to begin negotiations in 2017 on “a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total...

Unitarian Universalists and other people of faith gathered in April 2017 for a whirlwind 3-day conference in New York City. The Unitarian Universalist United Nations Office’s annual Intergenerational Spring Seminar this year was centered on the theme “Arm in Arm: Interfaith Action to Disarm Our...

On the morning of August 6, seventy years after the U.S. dropped the atomic bomb, I was in Hiroshima. I entered sacred time and space in a ceremonial ritual at a place called “The Mound”—said to contain remains of the 70,000 people incinerated in the blast. A Buddhist monk stood before an...