Washington, April 14: US President Barack Obama declared the world safer Tuesday after a 47-nation summit agreed to a four-year deadline on securing vulnerable nuclear materials from terrorists.
“Because of the steps we’ve taken,” Obama told a news conference following the summit in Washington, “the American people will be safer and the world will be more secure.”
The unprecedented gathering met the challenge posed by Obama, who said the world was littered with poorly guarded fissile material and that a nuclear-armed militant group would threaten “catastrophe.”
“We welcome and join President Obama’s call to secure all vulnerable nuclear material in four years, as we work together to enhance nuclear security,” the leaders said in a joint communique.
Hosting the largest summit in the United States in over six decades, Obama also pressed China and other UN Security Council skeptics to back UN sanctions on Iran over its controversial nuclear program.
“I am going to push as hard as I can to make sure that we get strong sanctions that have consequences for Iran,” Obama said at the end of the summit.
Amid mixed signals from Beijing, Chinese President Hu Jintao told the summit that Beijing “firmly” opposes atomic weapons proliferation, while backing civilian uses.
On what are commonly referred to as loose nukes, Obama pressed his guests “not simply to talk, but to act.”
“Nuclear materials that could be sold or stolen and fashioned into a nuclear weapon exist in dozens of nations,” Obama said.
He said al Qaeda had tried to obtain a nuclear bomb and that radioactive material as small as an apple was enough to kill thousands of people.
“It would be a catastrophe for the world — causing extraordinary loss of life, and striking a major blow at global peace and stability.”
The summit leaders agreed in their communique to non-binding, only partly defined measures to combat nuclear trafficking, including sharing information and detection, forensics and law enforcement expertise.
The leaders said they “recognize the need for cooperation among states to effectively prevent and respond to incidents of illicit nuclear trafficking.”
But increased security must “not infringe upon the rights of states to develop and utilize nuclear energy for peaceful purposes and technology,” summit participants said.
Mexico gave Obama’s initiative a boost by agreeing to give up weapons-grade uranium. Ex-Soviet Ukraine and Canada made similar pledges on Monday after Chile’s earlier moves.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced plans to spend up to 2.5 billion dollars to dispose of plutonium from its massive defense program.
Russia and the United States also signed a new protocol pledging to complete the disposal of 34 tons of excess weapons-grade plutonium each, enough to make 17,000 weapons.
–Agencies