MINSK, 24 February (BelTA) - Belarus calls on the Conference on Disarmament to take maximum efforts to overcome the existing differences and to start substantive work as soon as possible through a comprehensive and balanced program of work within its mandate, Belarusian Minister of Foreign Affairs Vladimir Makei said as he addressed the high-level segment of the Conference on Disarmament, BelTA has learned.
“Any armed conflict zeroes out social and economic achievements and human values, throws states back many years in their development turning them into a fertile ground for organized crime and terrorism," the minister noted.
“The last quarter of a century can be described as a golden age in disarmament diplomacy," he said. "The treaties and agreements concluded at that time laid the groundwork for international security and strategic stability. The Biological and Chemical Weapons Conventions have imposed global bans on the development and use of two types of weapons of mass destruction.”
Vladimir Makei noted that the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was the starting point for large-scale processes of reduction of nuclear arsenals of the USSR and the United States and the renunciation of nuclear weapons by South Africa, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and Belarus, thus having minimized the nuclear threat and risks of possible nuclear confrontation.
"The hope that the new system of post-Cold War international relations would be based on mutual respect and cooperation rather than rivalry fostered a false sense of complacency. Peace and security were taken for granted, and disarmament and arms control issues were put on the back burner as they seemed to have lost their relevance,” he noted.
