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Josefin Lind (Secretary General, Swedish Physicians against Nuclear Weapons)

1. What actions have you been taking to help realize the nuclear weapons ban treaty? Now that the treaty is open for signatures, what will be the focus of your work?

Swedish Physicians against Nuclear Weapons has worked for many years to promote the idea of a nuclear weapons ban in Sweden. We have strengthened the support within civil society and the public but also debated and argued for the ban in parliament, with civil servants and other influential people. We have arranged both open hearings and seminars, closed round tables, brought the topic up in op-eds, on social media, in blogs and tried to make media interested in the topic.

Our focus in Sweden in the time ahead will be to keep the pressure and excitement of the treaty up. There will be an investigation of the implications of the treaty for Sweden and we will use this time to analyse and debate the different strengths and critics of the treaty.

2. What do you think is the key to creating a world without nuclear weapons? How can we make good use of the treaty to reach that goal?

One of the key things to realise the vision of a world without nuclear weapons is I think to make the option to go nuclear weapons free for the nuclear weapons states appealing. We need to make the status quo become obsolete and an anomaly in international relations. By using the treaty to show how the majority rejects nuclear weapons we can hold the pressure up and make nuclear weapons less attractive. The actual prohibitions in the treaty are also great ways of making it practical more difficult to maintain the nuclear arsenals, eg by divesting from production of nuclear weapons and not support planning in the use of nuclear weapons.

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