International agreements on human rights that have been reached and established through many years of strenuous efforts involving so many people have been casually and brutally violated just by one nation’s leader.

That is the horrifying spectacle that has been unfolding in Ukraine since Feb. 24 last year.

In Bucha, a city close to Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, Russian troops tortured and killed unarmed citizens and left their bodies in the streets. Mariupol, in eastern Ukraine, was reduced to rubble by Russia’s indiscriminate attacks.

A large nuclear power plant in southeastern Ukraine also became a target of Russian attacks. It is believed that numerous Ukrainian children were taken to Russia.

RUSSIA’S BEHAVIOR MUST NOT BE TOLERATED

Russia has behaved in an outrageous manner without showing any commitment to its responsibility as a major power while totally ignoring rules and systems to protect the lives of civilians and prevent an escalation of war.

In an extension of the country’s horrible behavior, Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly threatened to use nuclear weapons since last year.

During the 78 years since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the closing days of World War II, no nuclear weapon has been used in war although there have been nuclear accidents and tests that led to radioactive contamination.

Not only has it been widely recognized that nuclear arms would cause disasters with serious long-term effects. The assumption has also been widely shared in the world that any use of a nuclear arm would fundamentally undermine the order and morals that have been built and guarded by the international community.

Putin has been threatening to use weapons that have come to be seen as realistically unusable. He has been acting in a way that challenges human norms. And his threat has been aimed at Ukraine, which voluntarily abandoned the nuclear arms the Soviet Union had deployed to the country by transferring them to Russia in the 1990s.

Moscow should reflect deeply on how sinful and absurd an act that nuclear intimidation is.

The risk of nuclear weapons being actually used has never been such a realistic danger since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, which brought the world to the brink of nuclear warfare between the United States and the Soviet Union.

The security situation concerning nuclear weapons today has changed dramatically in the few years prior to the 78th anniversary of the atomic bombings of the two Japanese cities.

NUCLEAR DETERRENCE REGIME HAS BECOME SHAKIER

If Putin’s nuclear intimidation is allowed to go unpunished, the momentum for the international nuclear disarmament campaign will wane.

It could send a wrong message to countries such as China, which is seeking to beef up its nuclear arsenal, and North Korea, which adheres to its program to develop nuclear arms, convincing them of the effectiveness of nuclear arms.

It is an urgent challenge confronting the international community to take effective steps to first prevent the use of nuclear arms and then preclude the possibility.

From this point of view, the Group of Seven summit held in Hiroshima in May was significant in that the G-7 leaders put up a united front in condemning Russia and strongly warning Moscow against the use of nuclear arms.

It is also notable that the leaders of nuclear powers and countries protected by the nuclear umbrella including India and others that were invited to attend the event visited the Peace Memorial Museum and heard stories of the horrors of the nuclear devastation directly from atomic bomb survivors.

But their visit was unofficial, and the leaders did not bother to express their thoughts and feelings about what they saw and heard candidly to the people of their respective countries.

The G-7 Leaders’ Hiroshima Vision on Nuclear Disarmament, released at the summit, justified the concept of nuclear deterrence, saying, “nuclear weapons, for as long as they exist, should serve defensive purposes.” The document offered no clear path toward the elimination of nuclear weapons.

Nuclear deterrence--the military doctrine dating to the Cold War era that claims a country can deter an enemy from attacking it by promising to use nuclear arms in retaliation--is based on the assumption that the leaders of nuclear powers act reasonably.

Putin’s behavior, however, has ruined the credibility of this assumption.

The problem is not limited to Russia. The West is facing a growing risk of the emergence of a political leader who tries to incite the public with populist rhetoric while disregarding reason.

The G-7 leaders should take criticism against Russia as a warning for themselves. They should start taking concrete steps toward the elimination of nuclear arms without being complacent with the frayed system of nuclear deterrence.

DIALOGUE AND ACTION FOR NUKE-FREE FUTURE

In February, Putin said he was suspending Moscow’s participation in the New START treaty, the last remaining U.S.-Russia nuclear arms control pact designed to limit the numbers of strategic offensive arms such as long-range missiles and nuclear warheads each country is allowed to possess.

The history of nuclear arms reduction has been plagued with setbacks and stagnation. In 2002, then U.S. President George W. Bush withdrew the United States from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and in 2019, Washington, under the administration of then U.S. President Donald Trump, pulled out of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty.

In 2021, Britain announced plans to enhance its nuclear capabilities.

The other major nuclear powers have been acting in a grossly insincere manner as they have neglected to make serious efforts to reduce their nuclear arms as required by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty while criticizing Russia over the matter.

It is hardly surprising that many non-nuclear countries have a deep sense of distrust and discontent toward the nuclear powers.

The unified front against Russia’s nuclear intimidation should not be confined to the leading democracies. Japan has the mission of working to build up solidarity among a broad range of countries including non-nuclear nations for the vision of a world without nuclear weapons.

It is vital for Tokyo to expand its channels of communication with non-nuclear nations. From this point of view, the Japanese government’s adamant refusal to get involved in the international movement to promote the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons is baffling.

Japan should take part in talks over the treaty as an observer to start serious dialogue with signatories for the cause.

What is worrisome is a gap in stance toward the issue between the government, which is focusing its attention on its relationship with Washington, and the two atomic bombed cities. Atomic bomb survivors, known as hibakusha in Japan, are growing increasingly desperate to see a world without nuclear weapons before they die.

Japan’s experiences of nuclear horrors are vital for promoting the movement to ban the use of nuclear arms and eventually eliminate them. The Japanese government needs to enhance its communication and cooperation with the cities that were ravaged by the atomic bombs 78 years ago.

--The Asahi Shimbun, Aug. 6