Obama moves ahead on nuclear weapon curbs
09 Apr 2010
A year ago, US President Barack Obama pledged to work for the elimination of nuclear weapons and within months he got the Nobel Peace Prize. This week, the world is getting some results.
The US president met his Russian counterpart in Prague Thursday, to sign a new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. It will cut the number of long-range warheads deployed by the world's two largest nuclear powers by roughly a third, to 1,550.
The document is important, but it's the legacy of an arms race that's essentially over. Washington isn't worrying much about the men in the Kremlin any more; it believes the real threats come from North Korea, Iran and the caves along the Afghan-Pakistan border.
So it's taking other steps with those threats in mind.
The Obama administration released a new policy statement known as the Nuclear Posture Review, ending development of new weapons and limiting how the US would use the ones it has.
Obama is scaling back, pledging that Washington won't use nuclear weapons against any nation that abides by the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Translation: if Iran and North Korea honour the treaty, Obama says they needn't fear American nukes.
Next week, Obama will convene an unprecedented Global Nuclear Security Summit with more than 40 heads of state, to find new ways to keep nuclear materials out of the hands of threatening leaders, terrorists and arms traffickers. Once again, Iran and North Korea are likely to come-up in the conversation.
