By After a nearly a month of meetings and proceedings, the 10th Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference (RevCon) came to a close at the end of August 2022. The conference and its lack of outcome document were viewed with disappointment by civil society, including the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons who called the RevCon a “failure”.
The outcome document suffered dilution throughout the proceedings, with Russia finally refusing to accept the final version leaving the RevCon without an agreement. This was an outcome of weak collective leadership and disunity among the nuclear powers. Their most explicit joint position was to reject any timebound commitments to fulfill their NPT disarmament obligations
With no concrete actions and no final consensus document the NPT has failed to deliver meaningful progress toward a world without nuclear weapons.
Pax Christi International advocates for greater cooperation among powerful countries, especially nuclear-armed states and those who host nuclear weapons. The recent First Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Vienna stands in contrast to the failure of the RevCon. Vienna saw states taking action and making commitments, for the sake of helping victims of nuclear testing and countries most at threat from nuclear weapons. We urge continued action at the grassroots, national, and international levels to fully realize the promise of both the NPT and TPNW.