UN adopts treaty to ban nuclear weapons; India skips talks

India says Geneva-based CD is the single multilateral disarmament negotiation forum

Over 120 countries have voted in the UN to adopt the first-ever global treaty to ban nuclear weapons, even as India and other nuclear powers including the US, China and Pakistan boycotted the negotiations for the legally binding instrument to prohibit atomic weapons.
 

The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, the first multilateral legally-binding instrument for nuclear disarmament to have been negotiated in 20 years, was adopted yesterday amid cheers and applause by a vote of 122 in favour to one against (Netherlands) and one abstention (Singapore).

India and other nuclear-armed nations — the United States, Russia, Britain, China,