Three Nobel Peace Prize Laureates, including ICAN (founded by MAPW) and our global federation, IPPNW, have today published an open letter.
Dear Presidents Donald J. Trump and Vladimir V. Putin,
We write to you as Nobel Peace Prize Laureates committed to the elimination of nuclear weapons. At this moment of extreme nuclear danger, we call on you to take urgent steps to de-escalate tensions and to engage in meaningful negotiations for nuclear disarmament.
The current climate surrounding nuclear weapons is the most volatile in decades.
Alarmingly, we are witnessing a resurgence of dangerous ideas which had been relegated to Cold War history books: radical new calls for nuclear proliferation and the extension of nuclear deterrence practices. The expansion of nuclear weapons capabilities is not a route to safety — it only increases the risk these weapons will be used by accident or design. The only viable security strategy is one that moves the world away from the brink of nuclear catastrophe and prioritizes disarmament.
As the States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) declared at their recent meeting in New York:
“The long-standing disarmament and non-proliferation architecture is being eroded, arms control agreements abandoned, and military postures hardened, further weakening the existing global security architecture. A tense and increasingly polarized international security environment, combined with a lack of trust and communication, exacerbates the existing dangers of nuclear weapons use. Urgent action is needed to rebuild dialogue, restore confidence and trust, recommit to nuclear disarmament, and prevent a return to nuclear brinkmanship with catastrophic consequences for all humankind.”
Recent statements from your administrations have featured rhetoric about the desirability of a world without nuclear weapons and the exorbitant cost of nuclear weapons, funds that could be put to far better use. Talk about denuclearization must be matched by deeds. The world cannot continue to walk the edge of catastrophe.
The hibakusha, survivors of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and survivors of nuclear weapons testing around the world, carry with them the painful memories of the horrors that nuclear weapons inflict on human beings. They know, from firsthand experience, that no one should ever have to endure the suffering that these weapons cause.
This June 21, a group of hibakusha will arrive in Reykjavík aboard the Peace Boat where they will visit Höfði House – the site of one of the most promising moments in the history of nuclear disarmament. The 1986 summit between Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev in Reykjavík paved the way for significant arms reductions. They very nearly achieved an historic breakthrough for the elimination of all nuclear weapons. That moment proved that political will can overcome seemingly insurmountable divides. You have an opportunity now to recapture that spirit, and to go further and achieve what Presidents Reagan and Gorbachev could not: the total elimination of nuclear weapons.
As Nobel Peace laureates, we urge you to meet with one another to reach an agreement on total nuclear disarmament.
As the Chair of The Norwegian Nobel Committee Jørgen Watne Frydnes said at the Nobel Peace Prize Ceremony in December 2024:
“Disarmament requires courageous and visionary political leaders. None of the nine countries that possess nuclear weapons – the United States, Russia, China, France, the United Kingdom, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea – appear interested in nuclear disarmament and arms control at present.”
This is the moment to show the world the courageous and visionary leadership that is needed. Nuclear weapons are not an inevitable force of nature that must be endured. They were built by human hands, and they can be dismantled by human hands. All that’s required is political will. It is within your power, as Presidents of the most powerful nuclear countries in the world, to end nuclear weapons before they end us. But, as the Doomsday Clock shows, time is running out. Meet. Talk. Eliminate nuclear weapons for good.
With utmost urgency and hope,
Terumi Tanaka, Shigemitsu Tanaka, and Toshiyuki Mimaki, on behalf of Nihon Hidankyo, Nobel Peace Prize 2024
Melissa Parke and Akira Kawasaki, on behalf of ICAN, Nobel Peace Prize 2017
Michael Christ, on behalf of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, Nobel Peace Prize 1985