Now more than ever we need a world without nuclear weapons.”
-U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Twitter
OSLO, Norway – The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday, a forceful show of support for a grassroots effort that seeks to pressure the world’s nuclear powers to give up the weapons that could destroy the planet.
The choice of the little-known coalition of disarmament activists put the Nobel committee again at the forefront of geopolitics at a time when fears are rising over North Korea’s nuclear and missile program and the invective it has drawn from U.S. President Donald Trump.
The group “has been a driving force in prevailing upon the world’s nations to pledge to cooperate … in efforts to stigmatize, prohibit and eliminate nuclear weapons,” said Norwegian Nobel Committee chairwoman Berit Reiss-Andersen.
More than 120 countries approved the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in July at the United Nation, over opposition from nuclear-armed countries and their allies. The U.S reiterated its position that the treaty “will not result in the elimination of a single nuclear weapon.” -From AP Report