THE Scottish Greens have pledged to push for an independent Scotland to sign up to an international treaty banning nuclear weapons.
The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons will come into force in 90 days’ time, after Honduras on Saturday became the 50th country to ratify it.
The world’s five open nuclear powers, including the UK, have not signed the treaty.
At the Greens’s autumn conference at the weekend, a motion by International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons member and Scottish CND vice-chair Janet Fenton was passed unanimously.
Scottish Greens external affairs spokesperson Ross Greer said: “It’s fantastic that after decades of campaigning nuclear weapons will now be indisputably illegal under international law.
“The US, Russia, China, the UK and France have yet to respond to their impending ‘rogue nation’ status but this is a clear message from the international community that the existence of these truly evil weapons will no longer be tolerated.
“It is shameful that the UK continues to invest hundreds of billions in nuclear weapons we do not need and should never use.
“Greens are clear that there’s no place for Westminster’s weapons of mass destruction in Scotland.
“Removing Trident from Faslane through a vote for independence would deal a huge blow to the UK’s superpower delusion and mark real progress towards disarmament.”
Fenton said: “Global Greens supported the UN in setting up the negotiations for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.
“Greens in Scotland have always understood the nefarious and deadly interconnections between nuclear weapons, the climate emergency and loss of biodiversity arising from centralised patriarchal structures and misuse of fragile resources.
“Now that the TPNW is irreversibly completed, we in Scotland can play our part in moving from prohibition to elimination.”
Nuclear disarmament campaigners gathered outside the Faslane Naval Base on Sunday to celebrate the 50th ratification of the Treaty.
It declares that the countries which give it there support must “never under any circumstances develop, test, produce, manufacture, otherwise acquire, possess or stockpile nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices”.
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