Japan and Kazakhstan should leverage their experience as atomic bomb and nuclear testing victims when they co-chair an upcoming conference aimed at pressing eight key countries to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, a U.N. official said recently.
"Japan has a moral responsibility, Kazakhstan has a moral responsibility with regard to leading the CTBT closer to its entry into force," Lassina Zerbo, executive secretary of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization, said in a one-on-one interview in New York.
"This is a golden opportunity for Japan and Kazakhstan to do more than what has been done for the past 18 years," he said.