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Call for grassroots action to dismantle nuclear weapons

“We need a new paradigm of leadership – the leadership exercised by ordinary people who have decided to reject the ‘stability’ of deterrence, which rests ultimately on the threat of mutual annihilation.”

Arab World Protests Could Reignite Anti-Nuke Campaign By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS, Mar 7, 2011 (IPS) – The global civil society campaign for the abolition of nuclear weapons could be politically reignited by the phenomenal successes of the grassroots demonstrations in Egypt and Tunisia, shadowed closely by Libya, Bahrain, Yemen and Jordan.
“Developments in the Middle East [and North Africa] show how fragile ‘stability’ is when people’s needs and desires are ignored,” says Hirotsugu Terasaki, executive director of the Office of Peace Affairs at the Tokyo-based Soka Gakkai International (SGI).

“There is no more natural desire than to be free from the threat of nuclear weapons. This is something shared widely, universally, among the world’s people,” he said.

Asked what role global civil society can play in the worldwide campaign to abolish nuclear weapons, Terasaki told IPS: “The mission of civil society is to empower and amplify the voices of ordinary citizens so that we can move the world’s policy-makers, insisting they take real and meaningful steps towards nuclear weapons abolition.”

Because the threat is so vast and pervasive, he pointed out, “We need a new paradigm of leadership – the leadership exercised by ordinary people who have decided to reject the ‘stability’ of deterrence, which rests ultimately on the threat of mutual annihilation.”

A lay Buddhist organisation with an estimated 12 million members in over 192 countries and territories, SGI has long been active in the growing NGO campaign towards a nuclear weapons-free world. ……

Arab World Protests Could Reignite Anti-Nuke Campaign – IPS ipsnews.net

March 7, 2011 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 2 WORLD, Religion and ethics