Gorbachev Hails Pugwash’s Contribution to Peace, Calls For Perseverance to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons
Media Release
For Immediate Release
July 7, 2007
Gorbachev Hails Pugwash’s Contribution to Peace, Calls For Perseverance to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons
(Pugwash, Nova Scotia) Former Russian President Mikhail Gorbachev sent a fervent message to international disarmament experts meeting in Pugwash, Nova Scotia, urging them to find ways to eliminate nuclear weapons and prevent an arms race in space.
“We need a lot of creative thinking to make up for lost time and build an intellectual foundation for agreements that would dramatically cut the arsenals of nuclear weapons on the way to their elimination and prevent an arms race in space,” wrote Gorbachev. “We need your brainpower not just to analyze the problem, but to find solutions.”
The message was received by the two dozen experts from fifteen countries who were convened, by the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs and others. The participants included former United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs Jayantha Dhanapala, Mayor of Hiroshima Tadotoshi Akiba, and Canadian Senator Roméo Dallaire.
Gorbachev received the Nobel peace prize in 1990 for his leading role in ending the Cold War. “The role of the anti-nuclear movement was equally important during the years when the joint efforts of people and leaders in the East and West brought the Cold War to an end,” he wrote.
He had special praise for the Pugwash group’s late founder, former Manhattan Project scientist Sir Joseph Rotblat, describing him as “a truly visionary leader whose example will continue to be an inspiration to all of us.”
Rotblat and the Pugwash group were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1995.
“Nuclear weapons have become greater problems than those they were meant to solve,” said Jonathan Granoff, President of the Global Security Institute, a conference sponsor. “This meeting will produce a strong set of recommendations to achieve nuclear disarmament.”
The Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs was founded fifty years ago this week at a controversial meeting of twenty-two nuclear scientists from both sides of the Iron Curtain in the village of Pugwash, Nova Scotia.
The group went on to grow into an international movement of scientists committed to nuclear disarmament.
President Gorbachev’s message was read following a presentation of the 1995 Nobel medallion from the international group to the people of Nova Scotia in a special anniversary ceremony attended by Premier Rodney MacDonald.
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Jonathan Granoff, Global Security Institute, New York. (610) 668-5470
Steven Staples, Pugwash communications consultant c. 613-290-2695
Steven Staples
Director
Rideau Institute
30 Metcalfe Street, Suite 500
Ottawa, Ontario K1P 5L4
CANADA
t. 613 565-9449 (direct)
c. 613 290-2695
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