Disarmament

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres called a possible new nuclear arms race "complete madness" and called for a change of course, BTA reported.

Under a gunmetal sky and driving rain, leaders of some of the world's most powerful nations gathered in Hiroshima on Friday to confront the horrors of nuclear weapons.

G7 leaders, including the heads of nuclear-armed Britain, France and the United States, arrived at the city's Peace Park to a sodden red carpet welcome from Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, who is from Hiroshima.

"The disappearance of the agreement between Washington and Moscow on the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in 2026 with the subsequent increase in nuclear weapons will open a Pandora's Box - non-nuclear countries will want to acquire nuclear weapons," the chairman of the Conference for the Review of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, Gustavo Zlauvinen, told

Britain is lifting the cap on the number of Trident nuclear warheads it can stockpile by more than 40%, Boris Johnson will announce on Tuesday, ending 30 years of gradual disarmament since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Turkey vetoed a request from the Greek Cyprus to participate as an observer at this year's Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, diplomatic sources said on Jan. 22.

The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the General Assembly meeting of the conference was held on Jan. 21.

The risk of using nuclear weapons is the highest since the Second World War, a senior UN security expert said, calling it an "urgent" issue that the world needs to address more seriously, Reuters reported.

Renata Dwan called this "an urgent issue that the world should take more seriously," Reuters is reporting.

Turkey will chair the last session of the ongoing 2018 disarmament conference in Geneva, it was announced on Aug. 20.

The United States said it would boycott the June 5 session of the Conference on Disarmament amid fears that Syria is using its presidency of the body to "normalise" the regime.     

Vladimir Putin has criticized the US for failing to keep their end of the bargain in a host of international disarmament agreements. He says Moscow will not exit any existing treaties, but promised an "instant, symmetrical response" if Washington decides to quit first.