Gidon Bromberg, a core member of EWI’s Task Force for Preventive Diplomacy, was honored by Time magazine this year for his organization’s innovative use of environmental activism to foster peace.

Time named Bromberg’s organization, Friends of the Earth Middle East, as one of its Heroes of the Environment for 2008. The organization’s projects reach across social, political, religious and ethnic lines in an effort to demonstrate that all our fates, regardless of our differences, are inextricably linked.

"We share the same environment, particularly the same water resources," Bromberg told Time. "And if we don't start working together, we're not going to have an environment."

EWI is proud to partner with individuals such as Gidon Bromberg and organizations FoEME. It is the vision, courage and creativity of such individuals that allows us to take the steps necessary to help build a safer and better world.

A Cold War approach to nuclear weapons, based on huge stockpiles and enemies like the USSR that no longer pose an imminent threat to the US, is outdated and fails to adequately address the security threats facing the US and the world today.In stark contrast to Gates, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon’s recent address to the East-West Institute recognizes how pursuing global disarmament is critical to achieving real security.

Regardless of who wins on November 4, a consistent, coherent voice to advance nuclear disarmament and global cooperative security based on the rule of law will remain necessary.

The Global Security Institute (GSI), along with many other civil society initiatives and governments, is advancing these goals on multiple fronts, in the US through the Bipartisan Security Group and internationally through the Middle Powers Initiative and the network of Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today said that it is more imperative than ever to make nuclear disarmament a reality given the twin economic and financial crises the world is currently facing.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has urged nuclear powers to dismantle their atomic arsenals in line with the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

“Nuclear weapons produce horrific, indiscriminate effects. Even when not used, they pose great risks,” said Ban in a Friday conference at the East-West Institute. “Accidents could happen any time. The manufacture of nuclear weapons can harm public health and the environment,” he added. Nuclear-armed states, which include the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China, have yet to fulfill their NPT obligations and abolish their warhead arsenals.

Emphasising that the financial crisis has triggered the need for an international cooperation to tackle global issues, United Nations has asked the nuclear weapon States, including India, to take the advantage of the atmosphere to revitalise the world disarmament agenda.

In his address to East-West Institute, an independent international body focusing on security issues, on Friday Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on the N-weapon States to move towards total elimination of nuclear weapons.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today said that it is more imperative than ever to make nuclear disarmament a reality given the twin economic and financial crises the world is currently facing.

 "The costs and risks of [disarmament's] alternatives never get the attention they deserve," Mr. Ban said in his address to the East-West Institute in New York. "But consider the tremendous opportunity cost of huge military budgets. Consider the vast resources that are consumed by the endless pursuit of military superiority."

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Friday presented a five-point proposal aimed at securing a world free of nuclear weapons.

"A world free of nuclear weapons would be a global public good of the highest order," Ban told a panel discussion at the United Nations headquarters in New York on nuclear disarmament. He lamented that so far nuclear disarmament "has remained only an aspiration, rather than a reality."

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today called on governments to start negotiations on a nuclear weapons convention as part of a five point plan to eliminate the risks from nuclear weapons.

In an address to a conference organised in the United Nations by the East-West Institute , Ban Ki-moon called for ‘the nuclear-weapon States, to fulfil their obligation under the [nuclear Non-Proliferation] Treaty’ by pursuing ‘a framework of separate, mutually reinforcing instruments. Or they could consider negotiating a nuclear-weapons convention, backed by a strong system of verification, as has long been proposed at the United Nations.” Ban Ki-Moon informed the conference that “Upon the request of Costa Rica and Malaysia, I have circulated to all United Nations Member States a draft of such a convention, which offers a good point of departure.”