Calling for a Peaceful Resolution of the Korean Peninsula Nuclear Crisis

About North Korea: I would like to post the GPPAC-ISG Emergency Statement Calling for a Peaceful Resolution of the Korean Peninsula Nuclear Crisis... GBBAC stands for Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict. Check out their website here.

On the morning of 9 October, the DPRK (North Korea) announced that it had carried out a nuclear test.

As the Global Partnership to Prevent Armed Conflict (GPPAC), the world-wide civil society-led network to build a new international consensus on peacebuilding and the prevention of violent conflict, we strongly protest such destabilizing and provocative acts.

Nuclear tests threaten the lives of inhabitants of surrounding areas and the DPRK's possession of nuclear weapons threatens the Korean Peninsula, Japan, East Asia and the entire world. Such testing is also in violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

The DPRK must refrain from any nuclear testing and development of nuclear weapons, and totally abandon its nuclear weapons programme. At the same time, we also call for abandoning approaches which are antagonistic, lack dialogue, and involve threats of use of force and resort to unilateral diplomatic pressure.

As a result of the extant cold war structures in the region, military pressure only exacerbates crisis and puts the Korean Peninsula at high risk of an armed conflict.

We call upon the governments of the US, China, South Korea, Japan and Russia to reopen the Six-Party Talks, based on the comprehensive structure outlined in the Six-Party Joint Declaration of September last year. The declaration calls on the DPRK to abandon its nuclear programme and for Japan and the US to then guarantee the DPRK's security and work towards the normalisation of diplomatic relations and economic cooperation. We also seek strong support from the UN Secretary-General, the Security Council, and all governments to use all available channels to work towards reopening the Six-Party Talks.

Recognising that international agreements concluding that the nuclear weapon states must undertake solemn nuclear disarmament negotiations are not being observed, we call for concrete action on the part of all these states to work towards achieving nuclear disarmament.

We also strongly oppose any moves by neighbouring countries to use the DPRK's claimed nuclear test as an excuse to proceed with plans for developing their own nuclear capabilities, which would violate the NPT and pose a grave risk to regional and global security..

As civil society organisations participating in the GPPAC network, we declare our solidarity with our counterparts in the region and, in cooperation with Northeast Asian civil society, pledge to work together with the UN and national governments to create and strengthen a framework to prevent armed conflict in the Korean Peninsula and to find a peaceful solution to the nuclear crisis.

10 October 2006

This statement is signed by the international secretariat and regional representatives of GPPAC.