Japan will not attend a U.N. conference on the treaty banning nuclear weapons, a top government official in Tokyo said Monday, noting U.S. nuclear deterrence is crucial to the country’s security and that its participation would send the “wrong message.

Japanese government's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi stated that participating as an observer would not align with Japan’s defence policy, which relies on the US' nuclear shield. View on eu

Survivors of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have lodged a protest with the Japanese government over its decision not to participate as an observer in a UN nuclear weapons ban treaty conference.

Germany has decided not to take part in a UN conference in New York to review a landmark treaty on nuclear weapons prohibition. "The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons dates back to a time before the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine,