Niall Ó Donnghaile (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Tá fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit don phlé agus cuirim fáilte roimh an reachtaíocht atá os ár gcomhair. Mar atá ráite ag comhghleacaithe, reachtaíocht tábhachtach agus suntasach atá ann, ní hamháin don tír seo ach don domhan ar fad.

Sinn Féin supports and welcomes the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons Bill. I expect it will receive unanimous support across the Seanad. The Bill will enable Ireland to become a state party to the United Nations treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons and will give effect to the provisions of the treaty in Irish law. The treaty prohibits participation in a range of activities relating to the transfer, development and use of nuclear weapons. That is welcome and something to which every country should agree.

Nuclear weapons threaten the very existence of the human race and life on this planet. They should not be developed, stored or used by anyone. I welcome long-standing Irish Government leadership on this issue globally. We need to create a world free from nuclear weapons, chemical weapons and weapons of mass destruction. Ireland must be a global leader on demilitarisation and disarmament.

In this debate I also believe we should commemorate and remember all the victims and survivors of nuclear weapons attacks. Two nuclear weapons have been used in war. Those were the bombs dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the US military in 1945. The two bombs killed 120,000 civilians and flattened both cities. The bombs were deployed to kill as many civilians as possible. It was a war crime and the effects are still felt today. It should never have happened and the development and use of nuclear weapons should have ended there but, regrettably, the opposite happened. Throughout the Cold War we saw a massive proliferation of nuclear weapons. That was and remains an existential threat to humanity itself. Nuclear weapons have been detonated on more than 2,000 occasions for testing purposes and demonstrations. That, obviously, has created significant environmental damage.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimated that in 2017 there were approximately 14,465 nuclear weapons in the world. They all need to be destroyed and put beyond use. The cornerstone of international efforts to begin nuclear disarmament is the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, known as the Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT. It divided countries into nuclear weapons states and non-nuclear weapons states. The NPT provides for the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons for countries without nuclear weapons and creates obligations on countries with nuclear weapons to negotiate an agreement leading to complete verifiable nuclear disarmament.

Ireland has been to the forefront of developments on nuclear disarmament and it was one of the first signatories to the NPT. That is worthy of remembrance, and a proud moment in Irish history. However, the NPT also has significant weaknesses. It allowed the US, Britain, Russia, France and China to keep their nuclear arsenals and cemented them as legitimate nuclear weapons holders. No country should legitimately or legally be allowed to stock, develop or use nuclear weapons. The NPT also failed to stop India, Pakistan, South Africa, Israel and North Korea from developing nuclear weapons. Thankfully, South Africa destroyed its nuclear weapons arsenal when the apartheid regime was coming to an end. Others should follow its lead.

In addition, the NPT has been used and abused for political means. Two nuclear states, the US, which signed it, and Israel, which unsurprisingly, has not signed it, and continues to lie and deny its nuclear weapons programme, forcibly stopped Iran's attempts to develop nuclear technology for civilian purposes, which is its right under international law. Essentially, Iran, a signatory of the NPT, was stopped from developing nuclear technology for civilian purposes by countries that have nuclear weapons and those who have refused to sign the NPT. The years of sanctions on Iran, despite it opening up its nuclear technology and nuclear sites to international investigation did significant damage to the NPT, especially the hypocrisy from Israel, the only nuclear armed state in the Middle East. A deal was, correctly, done in 2015 to lift sanctions and allow Iran its right to develop nuclear technology for civilian purposes, but the Trump Administration recklessly tore up that progressive and positive agreement under pressure from the Israeli Government.

To date, 70 countries have signed a new treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons and 26 states have ratified it or acceded to it. In order to come into effect, signature and ratification by at least 50 countries is required. This is the first multilateral treaty relating to nuclear disarmament to have been negotiated in 20 years. I welcome that this treaty provides for extensive prohibitions relating to the development, testing, producing, manufacturing, acquiring, possessing, stockpiling, transferring or receiving control over nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. The preamble to the treaty sets out some of the general principles and policies. It specifically acknowledges the disproportionate impact of nuclear weapons on women and girls. That is very welcome and it builds on the increasing focus on how women and girls are disproportionately affected by conflict and the historic UN Security Council Resolution 1325.

Article 1 of the treaty sets out a comprehensive list of prohibited activities in relation to nuclear weapons. That includes prohibitions on activities relating to the development, production, use or threat of use, testing, transfer and stockpiling of nuclear weapons. Article 4 sets out the disarmament requirements of nuclear weapons-processing states. I also wish to draw attention to Article 6, which concerns victim assistance and environmental remediation.Article 6(1) provides that states parties must provide victim assistance to individuals under their jurisdiction who have been affected by nuclear weapons use or testing. Such assistance should include age and gender-sensitive assistance and provide for the social and economic inclusion of victims.

Article 6(2) requires states parties to take remediation measures in respect of areas within their jurisdiction which have been contaminated by activities relating to nuclear weapons testing or use. This is important considering the terrible human suffering and environmental damage that the use and testing of nuclear weapons has created.

Unlike the non-proliferation treaty, nuclear armed states joining this treaty will have a time-bound framework for negotiations leading to the verified and irreversible elimination of their nuclear weapons programmes. The treaty is therefore well-written and important in the fight for nuclear disarmament but it has yet to get the international buy-in that it deserves and requires. It continues to be strongly opposed by countries that possess nuclear weapons. Not only do they oppose the treaty, but they are modernising their nuclear arsenals and many Cold War bilateral treaties between the USA and Russia have been rubbished or are under severe threat.

The slow pace of developments on nuclear disarmament within the non-proliferation treaty framework shows just how important this treaty is. In response to the treaty, three of the permanent members of the UN Security Council, the USA, Britain and France, released a joint press statement in which they argue against this treaty on nuclear disarmament. They said that, in their opinion, this treaty does not contribute to the development of international law. It is not surprising that all three of them have significant nuclear arsenals. There is something fundamentally wrong with the UN system when all five permanent members of the UN Security Council have significant amounts of nuclear weapons.

I want to again state my support for this treaty, for Ireland becoming a signatory, and for this Bill to give effect to the provisions of the treaty in domestic Irish law. While the treaty is not binding on states which are not a party to it, and while we have a long race to run until we reach full global nuclear disarmament, this treaty remains an important step in achieving nuclear disarmament. In parallel to giving support to this treaty, the Government should stop its erosion of Irish neutrality and oppose the further militarisation of the EU. It is not good enough to oppose nuclear weapons while we are still a part of NATO's so-called Partnership for Peace. We cannot on the one hand chastise countries that stockpile and develop nuclear weapons in Europe and, on the other hand, join EU battle groups and silently move towards creating a standing EU army with them.