Councillor K. Kavanagh
Moved by Councillor T. Kavanagh Seconded byCouncillor K. Egli WHEREAS, nuclear weapons are the most inhumane and indiscriminate weapons ever created; and WHEREAS, the current and unprecedented threat of use of nuclear weapons means that the risk of nuclear weapons use is at its highest since the Cold War; and WHEREAS, the long-term health and environmental consequences of one nuclear detonation include severe climate disruption, mass fire, and radioactive fallout which can lead to global famine and, in the most extreme case, human extinction; andWHEREAS, today’s nuclear arsenals contain weapons that are 1000 times more powerful than the ones that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki killing hundreds of thousands of civilians and caused the continuing suffering of many thousands more due to burns and related diseases; andWHEREAS, the peoples of the world will not be secure until the nuclear arms race is halted and nuclear weapons are prohibited and abolished; andWHEREAS, the World Health Organisation has stated that nuclear weapons pose the greatest immediate threat to human health and welfare and that no meaningful medical or disaster relief response to the detonation of an average-sized, 100 kiloton nuclear weapon is possible; andWHEREAS, the World Federation of Public Health Associations, of which the Canadian Public Health Association is a member, welcomes the entry into force of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons as the first comprehensive international prohibition of nuclear weapons noting they are the most damaging weapons of mass destruction, and the latest to be comprehensively banned.WHEREAS, catastrophic humanitarian risks are posed by the continued existence of nuclear weapons, including from any nuclear-weapon detonation by accident, miscalculation or design, and emphasizing that these risks concern the security of all humanity; andWHEREAS, nuclear weapons produce radioactive contamination that remains active for millennia, causing cancers and other illnesses that can persist across generations; andWHEREAS, the development, testing, and use of nuclear weapons disproportionately impacts women and girls and Indigenous Peoples. After 1945 in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, women were twice as likely to develop and die from solid cancer due to ionizing radiation exposure. This gendered difference was also observed after the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident, where girls were considerably more likely to develop thyroid cancer from nuclear fallout than boys. Over two thousand nuclear test explosions were conducted between 1945 and 2017 with Indigenous communities around the world bearing the brunt of these deadly experiments. Indigenous Peoples in present-day Australia, United States, the Marshall Islands, New Zealand, and Fiji were permanently displaced because of nuclear weapons testing as their lands became radioactive and unsafe for habitation, even decades after test sites closed. In Canada, many members of the Délı̨nę First Nation who worked at the Port Radium mine, mining and transporting uranium ore for use in the atomic weapons produced by the Manhattan Project, developed cancers due to exposure to low-grade uranium; andWHEREAS, even a limited use of the world’s more than 13,000 nuclear warheads would kill billions from radioactive fallout, crop failures, and starvation outside the city limits of the original target; andWHEREAS, the United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres, noting worrying signs of a new nuclear arms race as States continue to modernize their arsenals stated “Humanity remains one misunderstanding, one misstep, one miscalculation, one pushed button away from annihilation”; andWHEREAS, the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) which entered into force on January 22, 2021, is a landmark international agreement that comprehensively prohibits nuclear weapons with the ultimate goal of their total elimination; andWHEREAS, the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, having called for a ban on nuclear weapons since 1945, welcomed the adoption of the TPNW as a historic and long-awaited step towards their elimination; andWHEREAS, the World Medical Association, deeply concerned about the catastrophic consequences of nuclear weapons on human health and the environment, welcomes the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and calls on all states to promptly sign, ratify or accede to, and faithfully implement the Treaty; andWHEREAS, more than one thousand recipients of the Order of Canada who have joined an initiative led by John Polanyi, C.C., Douglas Roche, O.C. and the late Murray Thomson, O.C., are urging Canada to work to have NATO countries recognize the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) as a step towards the eventual elimination of nuclear weapons.WHEREAS, former Prime Ministers, Foreign Ministers, and Defence Ministers including The Right Honourable John N. Turner and Jean Chrétien, The Honourable Lloyd Axworthy, Jean-Jacques Blais, Bill Graham, John McCallum, and John Manley joined fifty-five allied non-nuclear weapons states’ leaders in 2020 stating that “nuclear weapons serve no legitimate military or strategic purpose in light of the catastrophic human and environmental consequences of their use” and support Canada signing and ratifying the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons; andWHEREAS, a Nanos poll taken in April 2021 show that a strong majority of Canadians agree Canada should join the Treaty. Seventy-four percent (74%) support or somewhat support Canada signing and ratifying the new Prohibition Treaty; andWHEREAS, the 2021 Ottawa Declaration, signed by prominent Canadians, notes that the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons declares that “any use of nuclear weapons would be abhorrent to the principles of humanity and the dictates of public conscience,” and calls on Canada to support the TPNW; andWHEREAS, cities and residents in cities are the main targets of nuclear weapons and the City of Ottawa has a special responsibility as Canada’s Capital City to ensure its residents have the right to live in a world free from the threat of a nuclear attack; andWHEREAS, seventeen Canadian cities including Cape Breton, Halifax, Langley, Montreal, North Saanich, Oakville, Pelham, Saanich, Sooke, Squamish, Sudbury, Toronto, Vancouver, Victoria, West Vancouver, White Rock, and Winnipeg have already spoken out in support of the TPNW by signing the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons Cities Appeal; andWHEREAS, The City of Ottawa joined the international nongovernmental organization Mayors for Peace in 1985 to work globally with other cities to press for nuclear abolition. In 2004, then-President of Mayors for Peace and the Mayor of Hiroshima, Mr. Tadatoshi Akiba, visited Ottawa and met high school students and civil society leaders and was generously hosted at City Hall by then-Mayor Bob Chiarelli. WHEREAS, in 2006 the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) adopted a resolution in entitled “Support for Mayors for Peace” which resolved o    that FCM express its unqualified support for Mayors for Peace “which is advocating for the abolition of nuclear weapons” o    that the FCM send a letter to the Government of Canada indicating support for Mayors for PeaceWHEREAS, Jim Watson, Mayor of the City of Ottawa, proclaimed August 6th Hiroshima Day and August 9th Nagasaki Day for two consecutive years in 2020 and 2021; andTHEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the City of Ottawa is deeply concerned about the grave threat that nuclear weapons pose to communities throughout the world. We firmly believe that our residents have the right to live in a world free from this threat. Any use of nuclear weapons, whether deliberate or accidental, would have catastrophic, far-reaching and long-lasting consequences for people and the environment. THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the City of Ottawa join with the other Canadian cities who have signed on to the Cities Appeal and support the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and call on our governments to sign and ratify it.