City of White Rock Joins the Mayors for Peace Appeal

Following our presentation with the resolutions below, Dr. Hugette Hayden and I are happy to announce that the City of White Rock tonight has joined the Mayors for Peace Appeal for the call to adopt the United Nations Ban on Nuclear Weapons and will urge the government of Canada to sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) Congratulations to the City of White Rock . Combined we represent Global Peace Alliance BC Society, World Beyond War, the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom.

Many cities around the world have already sent letters to their governments including, in Canada, Cape Breton, Halifax, Oakville, North Saanich, Saanich, Sooke, Squamish, Toronto, Vancouver, Victoria, West Vancouver, and, as mentioned above, Langley. (See https://cities.icanw.org/list_of_cities.) For more information, visit https://www.icanw.org/.

I am strongly urging you to consider the following motion or one similar:

WHEREAS the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) is a landmark global agreement calling for national and local governments to abandon nuclear weapons of war;

WHEREAS the UN Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) global agreement was adopted in 2017, and the Nobel Peace Prize Committee has acknowledged this initiative as providing the best pathway towards a world without nuclear weapons;

WHEREAS nuclear weapons threaten every nation’s security and would cause catastrophic humanitarian and environmental harm;

WHEREAS cities are the main targets of nuclear weapons, municipalities have a special responsibility to their constituents to speak out against any role for nuclear weapons in national security doctrines;

WHEREAS municipal governments form a close and active link with their constituents and local social movements;

WHEREAS a national awareness is needed to advance the standard determined by the TPNW against nuclear weapon states and their military alliances with countries that have nuclear weapons;

WHEREAS the time has come to end decades of deadlock in disarmament and moving the world towards the elimination of nuclear weapons;

WHEREAS there is no winner in an exchange of nuclear weapons;

BE IT RESOLVED that City of White Rock support the Mayors for Peace Appeal and send a letter to the government of Canada to break the unacceptable status quo regarding a tolerant nuclear weapons policy by taking decisive steps toward the global elimination of nuclear weapons and sign the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).