THE HOLY SEE APPEALS FOR NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT

VATICAN CITY, OCT 6, 2006 (VIS) - Archbishop Celestino Migliore, the Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the UN, intervened before the 61st session of the General Assembly on all disarmament and international security items.

  He said: "The Holy See takes this opportunity to appeal again to the international community to establish an obligatory legal framework aimed at regulating the trade of conventional weapons of any type, as well as regulating the know-how and technology of their production".

  With reference to nuclear weapons, he stressed the urgent need for dialogue on this issue. He said: "My delegation agrees that the international community seems almost to be sleepwalking down the path (...), in which rapidly growing numbers of states feel obliged to arm themselves with nuclear weapons and the threat of nuclear terrorism grows".

  Archbishop Migliore emphasized  the fact that the Holy See has, many times "asked that those governments which openly or secretly possess nuclear arms, or those planning to acquire them, agree to change their course by clear and firm decisions, and strive for a progressive and concerted nuclear disarmament. Policies of nuclear deterrence, typical of the Cold War, can and must be replaced by concrete measures of disarmament based on dialogue and multilateral negotiations".
DELSS/ARMS/UN:MIGLIORE                        VIS 20061006 (210)