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UNITED NATIONS: The UN Security Council vowed at an unprecedented summit hosted by US President Barack Obama Thursday to work to stop the spread of atomic weapons and rid the planet of all nuclear arms.
The 15-member body unanimously adopted a resolution committing UN member states to endeavour to consign nuclear weapons to history and endorsed a broad framework of actions to reduce global nuclear dangers.
"Although we averted a nuclear nightmare during the Cold War, we now face proliferation of a scope and complexity that demands new strategies and new approaches," Obama told the summit talks.
"Just one nuclear weapon exploded in a city, be it New York or Moscow, Tokyo or Beijing, London or Paris, could kill hundreds of thousands of people."
US officials have stressed the aim of the summit, shunned by Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, was to reinvigorate the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which will be the subject of a key review conference next year.
Thursday's meeting came as Iran's suspect atomic programme was once again thrust into the spotlight, with world powers warning tougher sanctions could follow if Tehran refuses to rein in its nuclear ambitions.
The Iranian mission at the United Nations angrily rejected as "totally untrue" fresh Western allegations that it was covertly seeking to develop nuclear arms.
Obama became the first American president to chair a meeting of the UN Security Council as the United States - the only nation to unleash a wartime atomic bomb - holds the body's rotating presidency this month.
Quoting former US president Ronald Reagan, Obama told the meeting, attended by outgoing UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei, that "a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought."
Chinese President Hu Jintao proposed that all nuclear-weapon states "abandon the nuclear deterrence policy based on first use of nuclear weapons and take credible steps to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the resolution sent "a united unequivocal and undivided message across the world today that we, as leaders of nuclear weapon states and non-nuclear weapon states, are together committed to creating the conditions for a world free from nuclear weapons.
"Today's meeting is also a recognition that we are at a decisive moment. We face the risks of a new and dangerous era of new state nuclear weapon holders and perhaps even non-state nuclear weapon holders," he added.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said one of the major security threats was the danger that nuclear components will end up "in the hands of terrorists." He called for ways to make sure that would not happen.
Medvedev added Moscow was ready to "move further" to reduce its nuclear arsenal.
The Security Council meeting came as Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad offered landmark talks between Iranian and US experts for the first time to allay fears about his country's nuclear programme.
"Why not just let them sit and talk and see what kind of capacity they can build? I think it is a good thing to happen," Ahmadinejad said in an interview with the Washington Post and Newsweek.
Russia signaled on Wednesday that it could back sanctions if Tehran fails to make concessions at the October 1 meeting with the five permanent members of the Security Council - which are all declared nuclear powers - plus Germany.
But on Thursday China said it still opposed slapping a fourth set of UN sanctions on the Islamic republic for its refusal to halt uranium enrichment, which the West says could give Iran the capability to acquire nuclear arms.
"We always believe that sanctions and pressure are not the way out," Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told reporters in Beijing. "We hope relevant parties will... redouble diplomatic efforts," she said.
The council resolution also urges all states to comply with the obligations of the NPT, to refrain from conducting nuclear test explosions and ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
The CTBT, which bans any nuclear blasts for military or civilian purposes, was signed in 1996 by 71 states, including the five main nuclear powers, and now has 181 member states.
A group of 17 Nobel laureates, including South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Dalai Lama and former South African president F.W. de Klerk, issued a joint statement calling for "a comprehensive ban on nuclear weapons."
There must be "a plan for the safe disarmament and disposal of all nuclear weapons under effective international control," they said.
- AFP/yb
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