Red Cross and Red Crescent representatives will join governments and civil society organisations from around the world this week when they come together in Mexico to examine the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons.
The conference will be attended by representatives of the Swiss-based International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the International Federation of Red Cross (IFRC), which represents Red Cross and Red Crescent organisations in 189 countries.
Australian Red Cross representatives, including CEO Robert Tickner, will join the IFRC delegation. The Australian Government will also be represented at the conference, which is being held this Thursday and Friday.
“This governmental conference provides an opportunity to ensure that the critical issue of the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons is kept on the international agenda, and practical steps are taken to ensure they are never used again,” Mr Tickner said.
“Even a limited nuclear war would have devastating humanitarian consequences, transcending national boundaries and affecting the environment for decades.”
“Governments of the world have been driven by humanitarian concerns to create conventions to ban the use of chemical weapons, land mines and cluster munitions – there is now growing support to ban the use of nuclear weapons on the same grounds.”
The Red Cross Red Crescent Movement has called for an international agreement to ban the use of nuclear weapons under international humanitarian law.
Australian Red Cross has played a pivotal role in these efforts, engaging with governments on the issue, and running a community-based advocacy campaign to raise awareness about nuclear weapons and their unacceptable humanitarian consequences.
“Our Make Nuclear Weapons the Target campaign has now reached one million people through social media,” Mr Tickner said.
“This growing community support has been critical in our global efforts to establish an international agreement to ban the use of nuclear weapons.”
Source: Australian Red Cross
Ryan Fritz
Ryan Fritz started The Advocate in 2014 to provide not-for-profits and charities another media platform to tell their worthwhile hard news stories and opinion pieces effortlessly. In 2020, Ryan formed a team of volunteer journalists to help spread even more high-quality stories from the third sector. He also has over 10 years experience as a media and communications professional for not-for-profits and charities and currently works at Redkite, a childhood cancer charity.
