Annual Report:
British Pugwash Group, 1999/2000
Two public discussion
meetings have been organized during the year. The first, in October,
and stimulated in part by events in Kosovo, examined the manner in which
the development of high-precision weaponry may be effective in peacekeeping.
The meeting was held in Oxford, was well supported and was felt to be
very successful. We are grateful to the Warden of Rhodes House for allowing
us free use of their meeting room.
Secondly, our annual London
meeting, in December, dealt with progress on achieving and implementing
effective international conventions for prevention of chemical and biological
warfare. Some 50 people attended, and the three speakers stimulated
a lively and constructive discussion.
UK participants have taken
part in a number of Pugwash workshops during the year, and also in the
49th Annual Conference - "Confronting the Challenges of the 21st Century"
- that took place in South Africa. Reports on these have, as usual,
been published in the Pugwash Newsletter and a copy of the Statement
of the Pugwash Council following the S Africa meeting has been forwarded
by our Chairman to the Prime Minister.
A report on our study, "Verifying
Nuclear Disarmament: a Role for Aldermaston" was published during the
year and distributed widely, including to all British Pugwash members.
Publication also occurred during the year of a book resulting from another
Pugwash study, "Nuclear Energy: Promise or Peril?", to which a number
of British members contributed in various ways. This is now available
from World Scientific at the special price to Pugwashites of US$35.
The war in Kosovo raised
a number of issues of grave concern, which have been communicated to
the Prime Minister, in a letter from our Chairman. Another matter that,
through the Chairman, we have taken up with the Defence Secretary, is
the preparations, reported to be in train in the UK, to collaborate
with the USA and France in providing laser "ignition" facilities, intended
for nuclear weapons development, and thus in apparent contravention
of at least the spirit of the CTBT.
A welcome development during
the year has been the formation of a British Student Pugwash group,
based at Imperial College. They have already had meetings with, respectively,
Sir Joseph Rotblat and Dr Pease as speakers, and we look forward to
working closely with them in future.
At the last AGM Frank Blackaby
asked to be relieved, in due course, of the duties of treasurership
and, following Frank's further request, we have been fortunate to be
able to co-opt Prof. John Finney to the Committee as Hon Treasurer.
Future Plans
Much time and effort has
been spent during the year by the Executive Committee, and particularly
by members of the Organizing Committee, in preparing for the 50th Annual
Pugwash Conference - Pugwash 2000 - that is due to be held in Cambridge
from 3rd - 8th August, on the theme of "Eliminating the Causes of War".
A major concern has been fund-raising and, although we are still some
way from achieving our target on this, we are extremely grateful to
those individuals and organizations who have already promised their
support. The scientific programme is formally the responsibility of
Pugwash Council, but they have broadly accepted the detailed proposals
that we have put to them, and which have resulted in the outline programme
and structure that has already been circulated to British Pugwash members,
with a request for contributions of short papers.
At the last AGM, interest
was expressed in issues surrounding low-level radiation effects, and
it is for this reason that arrangements have been made for the discussion
meeting that will follow this year's AGM.
At our request, the Rutherford-Applelton
Laboratory has agreed in principle to arranging a visit for our members
to their experimental laser facility. A date for this has yet to be
settled, but members who might be interested to attend are asked to
give their names to the Secretary.
Other possible topics that
the Committee has noted as candidates for either a research study or
a discussion meeting, or both, are:
- Merits/demerits of an
ABM system for UK/Europe
- Effects of nuclear warfare
on Britain
- How to cope with nuclear
terrorism
back
