Pugwash UK

Annual Report: British Pugwash Group, 2000/2001

The major activity of our Group this year has been to organize and host the 50th Annual Pugwash Conference, in Cambridge. This attracted some 200 participants, from around 50 different countries but including 20 from the UK, with a number of other British Group members being able to attend for several of the plenary sessions. The theme of the conference - Eliminating the Causes of War - gave rise to a great deal of productive discussion in the working groups and, overall, visiting participants seemed to be genuinely very pleased with the organization and conduct of the meeting, for which much of the credit goes to members of the Organizing Committee, and particularly the two joint chairmen, Professor Hinde and Sir Joseph Rotblat, and also, outstandingly, to Tom Milne. It is intended that the full proceedings will be published but, although much summary material is already available on the Pugwash website, at the time of writing negotiations with the prospective publisher have not been concluded.

Partly stimulated by the holding of the conference, which included some 30 "Student/Young" participants, the year has seen the establishment of Student Pugwash groups in a number of universities in this country and the Executive Committee has co-opted Dr Carsten Rohr, currently at Imperial College. He will provide contact with these groups.

Our regular December public meeting, held this year at Birkbeck College, was on the topical theme of ballistic missile defence - "Return of Star Wars: a Threat to Peace?". The three, very prominent, speakers - Dr Konovalov from Russia, Professor Garwin from the USA and Air Marshal Sir Timothy Garden - stimulated an excellent discussion and it was only unfortunate that, apparently due in good measure to crises in public transport, the attendance was somewhat lower than usual. However, following the meeting, a letter on the subject from Sir Joseph Rotblat appeared in the Times, the Chairman has written to the Prime Minister and, as reported below, arrangements are in hand for a follow-up meeting.

A major concern that has been expressed to the Committee is with US plans, apparently with possible UK participation, for a laser-based "ignition facility" to enable zero-energy nuclear weapons testing. In this connexion a very informative members' visit was made, in October, to the laser facility at the Rutherford-Appleton Lab., where members heard about work being carried out by various university and other groups on laser-induced nuclear fusion explosions. To follow this up the Chairman has written to enquire of Aldermaston how such work fits with their Stewardship programme.

Future Plans

A public discussion meeting immediately following the AGM, to be opened by Dr Michael Clarke, Director of the Centre for Defence Studies at King's College, London, will focus on the issue of the British Government's committment, under Article 6 of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and confirmed at the recent Review Conference, to pursue negotiations towards nuclear disarmament. This an important issue to take up at this time, particularly in view of the virtual absence of public debate elsewhere.

Linked with this, members will recall our earlier study, originally published in 1995 - "Does Britain Need Nuclear Weapons?". Our question remains unanswered at the political level and it was therefore decided to carry out a follow-up study, which is now under way, with the working title of "Eliminating British Nuclear Weapons". The working party ( Sir Hugh Beach, Prof Finney, Tom Milne, Dr Pease and Sir Joseph Rotblat) is consulting widely for this study, including from a number of British Pugwash members.

The US plans for "Missile Defence" continue to raise issues of major concern and, with the help of Sir Martin Rees, we are plaaning further action on this, with possible events in either or both of Cambridge and Glasgow later in the year. More news of these should be available at the time of the AGM.

Another topic, perhaps more contentious in Pugwash circles, on which members of our group have been involved in an earlier study, is the future place of nuclear energy against the background threats of both weapons proliferation and global warming. We are arranging a public discussion meeting on some of the issues involved for the UK, provisionally in December this year.

Members' visits have proved valuable in the past (if not particularly well attended) and we are attempting to arrange a visit for members to the Threat Reduction Unit at Aldermaston. It would be a help if those interested, particularly if not planning to attend the AGM, could contact the Secretary.

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