(AGENPARL) – GINEVRA (SVIZZERA) mer 22 giugno 2022

The ICRC’s Dr Marcel Junod was the first foreign doctor to reach Hiroshima to treat some of the victims after the 6 August attack.

One mile from the bomb’s epicentre,

everything had been torn apart, blasted and swept away as if by a supernatural power; houses and trees had disappeared,

he wrote.

The level of devastation prompted the ICRC to make its first call for the abolition of nuclear weapons in September 1945, a call taken up by the broader Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement in 1948.

In January 2021, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) entered into force as the first instrument of international humanitarian law to prohibit nuclear weapons and to attempt to mitigate the catastrophic consequences of using and testing nuclear weapons by requiring States that suffered a nuclear explosion to provide medical care for victims on their territory and to take measures towards environmental remediation. From 21 to 23 June 2022, States party to the Treaty will meet for the first time in Vienna, Austria to agree on concrete actions to implement the obligations under the Treaty.

Eirini Giorgou, a legal adviser with the ICRC, tells us about the status of the TPNW, and unpacks the ICRC’s legal and policy position on nuclear weapons.

Fonte/Source: https://www.icrc.org/en/document/why-icrc-wants-nuclear-weapons-eliminated