Humans are altering the Earth system in unprecedented ways, affecting its climate, geosphere, biosphere, and biodiversity. Recent studies have marked the beginning of the Anthropocene, this epoch of human-driven changes to Earth’s very chemistry and geology, with the Trinity Test of 1945 and the spread of radioactive fallout from hundreds of subsequent nuclear weapons tests. The Pacific has suffered an unproportionate burden from these changes. The communities there must be heard.

Why Pacific Island Countries?

From 1946 until 1996, over 315 nuclear tests were conducted in the Central and South Pacific, and Australia. This included atomic, hydrogen, atmospheric and underground tests. Radioactive fallout contaminated uninhabited islands and spread through the ocean and winds. Underground testing contaminated the marine environment. Island residents and their descendants have been dealing with the health consequences ever since.

The peoples of the Pacific Island countries are severely impacted by the Anthropocene. Pacific Islanders are still grappling with the repercussions of fifty years of nuclear weapons testing. They are extremely vulnerable to global climate change, including from droughts and water scarcity, typhoons and flooding, rising sea temperatures, and other anthropogenic-induced environmental changes.

It’s time for the people impacted by these changes the most to be heard.

The voices and views of the Pacific people have been marginalized in global nuclear policy debates. The concerns and perspectives of Pacific Island countries and the region’s Indigenous communities need to be articulated more widely. This discussion requires perspectives by those on the front line: those who suffer the ongoing consequences of nuclear weapons testing and mounting risks from climate change, and who can highlight the immorality and injustice of policies that perpetuate nuclear threats and privilege military spending above human and environmental priorities.

APLN is asking communities of the Pacific Islands to share their experiences and concerns –through creative expression in art, literature, film, and more – on the relationship between the Anthropocene, climate crisis, the legacy of nuclear weapons testing in the Pacific, and contemporary nuclear weapons policies and practices, including the ethical dimensions. We’re seeking to work with individuals, organizations, and civil society groups across the Pacific Islands to spark a broader dialogue on nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, by amplifying the voices from the Pacific Island countries, perspectives that have been left out of this conversation for far too long.  

The project aims to:

• Elevate and empower voices from the Pacific, including marginalized groups, by providing a platform for them to draw international attention to the injustices and inequities inherent in the Anthropocene;
• Raise global awareness of the shared responsibility and available tools to address human and environmental security challenges in the Pacific Islands; and
• Highlight the illogic and injustice of channeling resources into weapons programs that directly and indirectly exacerbate existential risks, including climate change.

The main project activities include:

1. Pacific Islands Creative Competition – an open call to individuals, educational institutions, NGOs, and community groups in Pacific Island countries to submit oral and written essays on the theme of “Nuclear Weapons and the Climate Crisis” and award prize money to contest winners.

• • Luisa Tuilau – I Walk BRAVO
  • Dorell Ben – Blood in the Water
  • Sharon Kumar – Our Pacific
  • Mere Tuilau – The Elephant in the Room
  • Bedi Racule – See you soon, lagoon

2. Voices from the Pacific Island Countries – a forum to connect the project contributors and to facilitate engagement with other members of the wider network across the region and globally.

3. Events – virtual and in-person events where winners of the Pacific Islands Creative Competition can share their winning entries and discuss challenges related to the Anthropocene.

• • APLN-NZCGS Webinar – Nuclear and Climate Injustice: Creative Perspectives from the Pacific Islands
  • Tenth Meeting of the CSCAP Study Group on Nonproliferation and Disarmament in the Asia-Pacific – “Pacific Islands and Disarmament” Session

4. Publications – timely, compelling, and policy-relevant publications that resonate with a diverse audience, including winning submissions from the creative competition. 

• Special Reports:
• • Milla Vaha – The Pacific’s Nuclear Legacy in the Context of the Climate Crisis
  • Maima Koro- Relational Security: Ethical Dilemmas of Geopolitics in the Blue Pacific Continent
  • Patrick Kaiku – Nuclear Justice for the Marshall Islands in the Age of Geopolitical Rivalry in the Pacific
  • Marianne Hanson – The Second Meeting of States Parties to the TPNW: A Summary Report
  • Jim Green and Dimity Hawkins – The Politics of Nuclear Waste Disposal: Lessons from Australia
  • Becky Alexis-Martin, Qurat Ul Ain, Kolby Kaller, Ben Donaldson and Matthew Maslen – Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons: Victim Assistance and Environmental Remediation in the Pacific
  • Vijay Naidu – Strengthening a Nuclear-Free Pacific

• Short Essays
  • Sylvia C. FRAIN and Fiona AMUNDSEN – Seeing the Sun: Nuclear (in)visibility in the Mariana Islands of Guam & Tinian
  • Brooke Takala – Keeping Nuclear Memories Alive
  • Nicole George – Making the “Invisible” Visible: Women and the Anti-Nuclear Resistance in the Pacific Islands

• Videos by PICC winners:
  • Dorell Ben- Blood in the Water
  • Luisa Tuilau – All the Way from Down Here
  • Bedi Racule – See You Soon, Lagoon

• Infographics
  • TPNW in the Pacific
  • Nuclear Tests in the Pacific
  • What is Nuclear Justice

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This project is sponsored by the Ploughshares Fund, through its diversity and equity initiative, Equity Rises, which seeks to identify and foster transformational ideas, encourage experimentation, and support a stronger and more diverse pipeline of leaders who are new in their careers or to the nuclear field.

For more information about the project, please contact:

    Elaine Natalie, Policy Fellow, APLN                 Tanvi Kulkarni, Policy Fellow, APLN