Archbishop calls for political will to end scourge of nuclear weapons

(July 13, 2011) Nuclear weapons have threatened humanity for far too long and the world's leaders lack the political will to remove this scourge, said the Vatican's ambassador to the United Nations. "Now is the time for a profound rethinking and change in our perception of nuclear weapons”, Indian Archbishop Francis Chullikatt told an audience in Kansas City, US. His address, delivered recently at the Catholic Center of the Diocese of Kansas, was sponsored by the diocesan Human Rights Office. Archbishop Chulikatt was invited to speak about the Catholic Church's teaching on nuclear deterrence, the use of nuclear weapons and the goal of a nuclear weapon free world. In his address, the prelate outlined the church's growing abhorrence of nuclear weapons and stressed that its condemnation of them has always been grounded in respect for life and the dignity of the human person.
Archbishop Chulikatt said that as development needs across the globe are outpacing the resources being devoted to them, the expense of building nuclear arsenals is "nothing short of sinful" and the "grossest misplacement of priorities." He noted that there are currently 20,000 nuclear weapons in 111 sites in 14 countries. More than half the population of the world lives in a nuclear-armed country and each year, countries spend $100 billion on maintaining and modernizing their nuclear arsenals. With regard to eliminating nuclear weapons, he said a critical first step would be an immediate ban on the testing of new weapons. To achieve that all countries should ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, he added.