Marshalls sue in the name of peace

From 1946 to 1958, the Marshall Islands were subjected to 67 separate nuclear detonation tests, including the largest nuclear test ever conducted by the U.S., the 1954 “Castle Bravo” test which detonated a 15-megaton device with power equivalent to one thousand Hiroshima blasts. The Marshallese have been suffering from radioactive fallout-related health and environmental problems ever since.

On April 24, the Republic of the Marshall Islands filed nine unprecedented lawsuits, with both the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and U.S. Federal District Court, against the nine world nuclear powers—the U.S., Great Britain, France, Russia, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel—accusing them of failing to comply with their obligations, under the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), to pursue negotiations for the worldwide elimination of nuclear weapons.

But rather than bristle with justifiable hostility, the Marshallese attitude toward the situation—as expressed by Senator Tony de Brum, the Minister in Assistance to the President of the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the man who masterminded the recent Majuro Declaration on Climate Leadership—is one of reconciliation and magnanimity.

“This application to the ICJ constitutes an action by one friend to remind another to abide by its legal obligations to secure a world of peace, free of nuclear weapons,” said de Brum in a statement to the Independent. “It is the least we can do for our children and other living things on Earth.”

The NPT is an agreement between the non-nuclear states—who pledged not to attempt to acquire nuclear armaments—and the nuclear states who, in return, vowed to begin negotiations to disarm themselves. Although the size of the arsenals are significantly smaller than they were at the height of the cold war, the legal case notes that there remain more than 17,000 warheads in existence, 16,000 of which are owned by Russia and the U.S. Today’s arsenals are still easily large enough to destroy all life on the planet several times over.

“The long delay in fulfilling the obligations enshrined in article VI of the NPT constitutes a flagrant denial of human justice,” the court documents read.

The documents also point out that although the arsenals may include fewer bombs now, the nuclear countries have never stopped upgrading the destructive power and delivery capability of their individual bombs, rendering today’s arsenals just as deadly as they ever were.

“The nuclear-armed states continue to peddle the myth that they are committed to multilateral disarmament initiatives, while squandering billions to modernise their nuclear arsenals,” said Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament general secretary, Kate Hudson, after the lawsuits were filed.