FORUM: "Remembering the Legacy, Renewing Our Commitment to a Nuclear-Test Ban." International Day Against Nuclear Tests 2025. Nuclear weapons today present tremendous dangers, but also an historic opportunity. Leadership will be required to take the world to the next stage -- to a solid consensus for reversing reliance on nuclear weapons globally as a vital contribution to preventing their proliferation into potentially dangerous hands, and ultimately ending them as a threat to the world. Strong non-proliferation efforts are under way. The Cooperative Threat Reduction program, the Global Threat Reduction Initiative, the Proliferation Security Initiative and the Additional Protocols are innovative approaches that provide powerful new tools for detecting activities that violate the NPT and endanger world security. They deserve full implementation. The negotiations on proliferation of nuclear weapons by North Korea and Iran, involving all the permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany and Japan, are crucially important. They must be energetically pursued. Nothing can play as crucial a role in avoiding a nuclear war or nuclear terrorist threat as the elimination of nuclear weapons. There have been a number of significant developments, discussions and initiatives relevant to its goals and objectives as well as conferences convened since the International Day against Nuclear Tests was first celebrated. Follow the conversation with the hashtags: #EndNuclearTesting, #IDANT, #InternationalDayAgainstNuclearTests, #AgainstNuclearTests, #29August, #StepUp4Disarmament. #NuclearWeaponsFreeWorld.
This important day arrives amid rising geopolitical tensions and growing nuclear risks — including the disturbing prospect of a return to nuclear testing.
In 2025, we commemorate the 80th anniversary of the first nuclear test. We must never forget the legacy of over 2,000 nuclear weapons tests carried out over the last 80 years.
The effects of these explosions have been horrific.
Nuclear tests drive displacement and contaminate lands and oceans. They sow the seeds of long-term health crises, including cancers and other chronic illnesses. And they deepen the cracks in the foundation of global trust, stability and peace.
We cannot accept this.
The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty remains the only internationally agreed, legally binding instrument to end all nuclear tests. Its entry into force, long overdue, is more urgent than ever. I call on all countries to ratify it — immediately and without conditions.
My message to leaders is simple: stop playing with fire. Now is the time to silence the bombs before they speak again.
António Guterres, United Nations Secretary-General.
Nearly three decades ago, the world took decisive steps to bring nuclear test explosions to an end. Those actions changed the course of history. Where once the ground shook with alarming regularity, today such events are rare, a testament to the strength of our collective resolve. On 29 August, the International Day against Nuclear Tests (IDANT), we reaffirm our commitment to placing non-proliferation and disarmament first, and to ensuring that no person ever again lives in the shadow of a nuclear explosion.
I will never forget standing at ground zero in Semipalatinsk, Kazakhstan – a site scarred by more than 450 nuclear tests – the closure of which we also commemorate on this day. I felt the full weight of that history, a sobering reminder of what the international community must never allow to happen again.
At the height of the cold war, such tests occurred almost weekly. They were not only a grave risk to global peace and security but also had a lasting impact on public health and the environment.
The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) was opened for signature in 1996 after years of determined multilateral effort. It reflected the combined strength of diplomatic will and scientific progress. By prohibiting nuclear test explosions conducted by anyone, anywhere, at any time, the Treaty transformed decades of aspiration into a shared commitment. It signalled that the world’s nations were ready to turn a historic page.
Before CTBT was opened for signature, more than 2,000 nuclear test explosions had been conducted worldwide. Since 1996, that number has fallen to fewer than a dozen. This dramatic decline is no accident. It reflects the strength of the norm created by our Treaty and the value that the international community places on preventing any return to testing.
The Treaty is already a proven success. It has brought almost all nuclear testing to an end, placing powerful constraints on the development of new nuclear weapons and the advancement of existing designs, while fostering a strong international expectation that testing belongs in the past. Entry into force will build upon this, giving us the full range of verification measures, including on-site inspections, to further reinforce what has already been achieved.
The success of the Treaty rests on science in the service of diplomacy. Its International Monitoring System (IMS), already operating with more than 300 stations and laboratories in over 90 countries, uses seismic, hydroacoustic, infrasound and radionuclide technologies to detect any nuclear explosion. Data from this network flow to the International Data Centre in Vienna, where they are processed around the clock and made available to all signatory States.
This transparency builds confidence. All States rely on the same objective information to assess adherence to the Treaty and to determine whether a nuclear test has taken place. Even countries that have not yet ratified the Treaty host facilities and benefit from the data. That participation reflects the value and credibility that nations place in a system built through global cooperation.
Those benefits extend well beyond peace and security: IMS data contribute to tsunami warning systems, support disaster response and help advance scientific research and understanding that serve us all.
Today’s international climate is marked by heightened tensions and evolving geopolitical dynamics. However, the record leaves little room for doubt: testing has come to an almost complete halt, and States continue to support and use the verification system. This reflects a near-universal view that nuclear testing has no place in the twenty-first century.
IDANT reminds us that change happens when people understand why it matters. Communities affected by past tests carry voices that deserve to be heard. Diplomats, scientists, educators and youth advocates help translate remembrance into prevention. Their work strengthens a culture of responsibility that maintains the silence we expect from test sites across the world.
As we observe the International Day against Nuclear Tests, we are also approaching another milestone. In 2026, we will mark 30 years since Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty was opened for signature. Anniversaries invite reflection, not only on what has been achieved but also on the work that lies ahead.
Our Treaty has already had a profound impact. Nuclear test explosions have become extremely rare, and the verification regime operates with global reach and trust. We look forward to the day when Treaty enters into force, enabling all elements of the verification regime to be deployed.
Achieving this will require the remaining States to take the final step. They have the opportunity to help complete what was started almost three decades ago. Their decision to ratify the Treaty would reinforce a commitment that has already proved its worth and support a system that benefits every region.
This International Day is a reminder that the absence of nuclear test explosions is not a matter of chance. It is the outcome of decades of dedication and collaboration. Let us continue to uphold that achievement.
In a noisy world, progress can sound like nothing at all. May the measure of our vigilance be silence of in place of nuclear testing, everywhere, for all time.
CTBTO Executive Secretary Robert Floyd.
ACTIONS
What should be done?
Can the promise of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) and the possibilities envisioned at
Reykjavik be brought to fruition?
We believe that a major effort should be launched by
the United States to produce a positive answer through concrete stages.
First and foremost is intensive work with leaders of the countries in possession of nuclear weapons to turn the goal of a world without nuclear weapons into a joint enterprise. Such
a joint enterprise, by involving changes in the disposition of the states possessing nuclear
weapons, would lend additional weight to efforts already under way to avoid the
emergence of a nuclear-armed North Korea and Iran. The program on which agreements should be sought would constitute a series of agreed and urgent steps that would lay the groundwork for a world free of the nuclear threat.
Steps would include:
• Changing the Cold War posture of deployed nuclear weapons to increase warning time and thereby reduce the danger of an accidental or unauthorized use of a nuclear weapon.
• Continuing to reduce substantially the size of nuclear forces in all states that possess them.
• Eliminating short-range nuclear weapons designed to be forward-deployed.
• Initiating a bipartisan process with the Senate, including understandings to increase confidence and provide for periodic review, to achieve ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, taking advantage of recent technical advances, and working to secure ratification by other key states.
• Providing the highest possible standards of security for all stocks of weapons, weapons-usable plutonium, and highly enriched uranium everywhere in the world.
• Getting control of the uranium enrichment process, combined with the guarantee that uranium for nuclear power reactors could be obtained at a reasonable price, first from the Nuclear Suppliers Group and then from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) or other controlled international reserves. It will also be necessary to deal with proliferation issues presented by spent fuel from reactors producing electricity.
• Halting the production of fissile material for weapons globally; phasing out the use of highly enriched uranium in civil commerce and removing weapons-usable uranium from research facilities around the world and rendering the materials safe.
• Redoubling our efforts to resolve regional confrontations and conflicts that give rise to new nuclear powers.
Achieving the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons will also require effective measures to impede or counter any nuclear-related conduct that is potentially threatening to the security of any state or peoples.
Reassertion of the vision of a world free of nuclear weapons and practical measures toward achieving that goal would be, and would be perceived as, a bold initiative consistent with America's moral heritage. The effort could have a profoundly positive impact on the security of future generations. Without the bold vision, the actions will not be perceived as fair or urgent.
• Redoubling our efforts to resolve regional confrontations and conflicts that give rise to new nuclear powers.
Achieving the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons will also require effective measures to impede or counter any nuclear-related conduct that is potentially threatening to the security of any state or peoples.
Reassertion of the vision of a world free of nuclear weapons and practical measures toward achieving that goal would be, and would be perceived as, a bold initiative consistent with America's moral heritage. The effort could have a profoundly positive impact on the security of future generations. Without the bold vision, the actions will not be perceived as fair or urgent.
Without the actions, the vision will not be perceived as realistic or possible.
We endorse setting the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons and working energetically on the actions required to achieve that goal, beginning with the measures outlined above.
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