Update from the CFR: World Leaders Vow to Confront Nuclear Threats

Daily News Brief March 27, 2012

Top of the Agenda: World Leaders Vow to Confront Nuclear Threats Fifty-three world leaders pledged to jointly combat the global nuclear terrorism threat at the end of a two-day nuclear summit in Seoul, South Korea. The leaders vowed to pursue nuclear disarmament and combat nuclear proliferation, while supporting "peaceful uses of nuclear energy" (al-Jazeera). Concerns over a planned North Korean rocket launch for next month dominated the summit, prompting international condemnation. U.S. President Barack Obama, who called for a "world without nuclear weapons," met with Russian and Chinese leaders to discuss Iran's nuclear program, which the West contends is for manufacturing weapons. Analysis "Since his Prague speech on nuclear disarmament in 2009, [Obama] has shifted attitudes both in the United States and internationally, changing the context in which these issues are debated. He moved things further on in South Korea by stating more forthrightly than he has in the past that the United States has more nuclear weapons than it needs," says this Guardian editorial. "On the one hand, states such as Iran and North Korea must not develop nuclear arsenals. On the other hand, the established nuclear powers--such as the U.S., Russia and China--must make deep cuts in stockpiles. Only by making such cuts can they retain the moral right to demand that others refrain from building nuclear bombs," says this Financial Times editorial. "Some of the warnings about nuclear terrorism in the wake of 9/11 were overdone; a lot of the claims that we would face a fifty-fifty chance of an attack were rhetorical flourishes at best, and there are a lot of reasons to believe that pulling off a nuclear attack is more difficult and less attractive than a lot of people thought. But that doesn't mean that it isn't a real risk," says CFR's Michael A. Levi in this CFR Interview.