Disarmament refers to giving up or reducing armed forces. Disarmament is a subject of national and international laws and policy. The arms races between nations involves issues of international security, international relations, terrorism, trading practices, humanitarian concerns and the preservation of the environment.
Nuclear disarmament seeks to achieve or maintain military stability by limiting or eliminating the numbers or types of weapons that may lawfully be produced, stockpiled or transferred. Some important disarmament laws include:
The 1972 Biological Weapons Convention prohibits the development, production and stockpiling of bacteriological (biological) weapons.
The 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty seeks to limit the number of states that may lawfully possess nuclear weapons and requires those states already possessing nuclear weapons to work towards their elimination.
In 1993, States adopted the Chemical Weapons Convention banning the development, production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons.
