Our world in these past 12 months has not seemed to improve for the better. Economic crises resulting from bad management as well as human greed continued to ravage several geographical regions, resulting in widespread unemployment and poverty. Armed clashes and terrorism persisted in Syria, and several spots in Africa, to name just a few. Above all, never before had the international community witnessed the threat of use of a full-scale nuclear war by one country against others. While North Korea has not yet carried out this threat, we should be reminded, once again, that as long as nuclear weapons still exist, the possibility of mass destruction of humankind is always with us.

There was a silver lining on the horizon when the UN General Assembly voted on 2 April 2013 to adopt the Arms Trade Treaty, after more than a decade of international efforts to bring it into existence. This first-ever treaty to regulate the US$70-billion-a-year trade in conventional weapons will make it more difficult for such weapons to fall into the hands of those intent on making war and other types of armed violence. The Treaty sets up a system of transparency and accountability whereby arms-exporting countries will be responsible for establishing and maintaining a national control system to regulate the export of ammunition/munitions fired, launched or delivered by the conventional arms covered in the Treaty. They also agree not to authorize any transfer of conventional weapons – or their ammunition/munitions, parts or components – if the transfer would undermine peace and security, or if they have knowledge that arms will be used in the commission of genocide, crimes against humanity, grave breaches of international humanitarian law, attacks against civilians, or other war crimes. If the export is not prohibited, each of the arms-exporting countries agrees that, prior to authorization of exports, it will assess the potential that conventional arms or related items will undermine peace and security or be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of international humanitarian or human rights law, or acts constituting terrorism or transnational organized crimes. The Treaty was open for signature on 3 June 2013 and will enter into force 90 days after being ratified by fifty countries.

The Arms Trade Treaty covers the seven major categories of conventional weapons included in the 1991 UN Register of Conventional Arms (battle tanks, armoured combat vehicles, large-calibre artillery systems, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships and missiles, and missile launchers) plus small arms and light weapons. However, the Arms Trade Treaty does not cover nuclear weapons, and, sadly, nuclear weapons are still not effectively regulated. The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), adopted by the UN general Assembly on 10 September 1996, has been ratified by 159 countries, but has not yet come into force since its condition that it is ratified by all the 44 countries listed in an annex to the CTBT has not been met. And North Korea, one of the countries in the aforesaid list, has become a nightmare for those policymakers who advocate keeping nuclear weapons for the sake of ‘deterring a nuclear war’. Common sense should prevail – all countries rich and poor, large and small, must totally eliminate nuclear weapons!

Just think of the indiscriminate nature of damage and injuries inflicted by nuclear weapons. When Nagasaki was bombed by a nuclear warhead on 9 August 1945, it immediately ended the lives of 40,000-75,000 victims, compared to the number of 70,000-140,000 instantly killed in Hiroshima by another nuclear warhead three days earlier. Nuclear weapons do not spare civilians not taking part in an armed conflict or objects, such as religious sites, which are protected by international humanitarian law.

As a poignant reminder of the indiscriminate atrocities wrought by nuclear weapons, the Sata Foundation, whose mission is to secure a better and more humane world, utilizes as our logo the charred head of the Madonna statue of the Urakami Cathedral situated at the epi-centre of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki. We fervently plea to all nations and peoples to use science and hard-earned taxpayers’ money for the betterment of welfare and living standards instead of wasting them on killing machines, in particular on the highly expensive costs of maintaining and increasing the estimated number of 20,000 warheads in the world’s combined stockpile of nuclear weapons.

When the statue of the Madonna of Nagasaki was exhibited in the Spanish city of Guernica and at the UN Headquarters in New York during the Review Conference on the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), visiting viewers were abhorred by nuclear weapons and concurred that never again should nuclear weapons be used. This statue as a powerful symbol for a nuclear-weapon-free world deserves international recognition at the same level as the Hiroshima Peace Memorial (Genbaku Dome), which has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage since 1996. Please join our cause for a universal recognition of the Madonna of Nagasaki as a symbol for a more peaceful and humane world.

As in the previous years, the Sata Foundation has organized the annual “Run for Peace” cycling rally in Chailly-sur-Armançon, France, to commemorate the anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (www.courirpourlapaix.com). This year’s 9th Run for Peace rally will be held on Saturday 27 July, with approximately 500 cyclists expected to take part. There will be three circuits: Hiroshima (160 km), Nagasaki (110 km) and Tohoku (68 km). Proceeds from the Rally go to charities whose work falls within the Sata Foundation’s mission.

Your kind support for the Sata Foundation’s causes would be most appreciated.