The Mexican government welcomes the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s decision to award the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), and warmly congratulates the group for its work on nuclear disarmament.
ICAN is a coalition of many well-known civil society activists based in Geneva, Switzerland that actively supported negotiation of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons adopted at the United Nations New York headquarters on July 7.
The Nobel Peace Prize underscores the key role played by organized civil society in promoting international peace and security, disarmament and non-proliferation. ICAN has worked to raise awareness worldwide about the catastrophic humanitarian consequences that the accidental or intentional use of nuclear weapons would have for the environment, ecosystems, climate change, development, global health and food security.
The three international conferences on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons, which took place in Oslo, Norway (March 2013), Nayarit, Mexico (February 2014) and Vienna, Austria (December 2014) used scientific evidence to demonstrate these consequences.
The treaty, which prohibits the development, testing, production, acquisition, possession, transfer and use or threat of use of nuclear weapons, was opened for signature on September 20 at the United Nations. The Secretary of Foreign Affairs of Mexico, Luis Videgaray, was one of the first to sign it. To date, it has been signed by 53 countries.
Since the beginning of the nuclear era, Mexico unilaterally and irreversibly decided never to develop nuclear weapons or to allow another country to install them in Mexico. Mexico was also the principal driving force behind the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean, better known as the Treaty of Tlatelolco, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year.