The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) is a coalition of non-governmental organizations in more than one hundred countries promoting adherence to and implementation of the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. This landmark global agreement was adopted in New York on 7 July 2017.
ICAN opened our first offices in Carlton, Melbourne, in 2006 and was launched at the Victorian parliament house in Melbourne in 2007. Since then, the campaign has been embraced by individuals and organisations throughout the world. Our campaign’s Australian founders were inspired by the tremendous success of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, which a decade earlier had played an instrumental role in the negotiation of the anti-personnel mine ban convention, or Ottawa treaty.
Since our founding, we have worked to build a powerful global groundswell of public support for the abolition of nuclear weapons. By engaging a diverse range of groups and working alongside the Red Cross and like-minded governments, we have helped reshape the debate on nuclear weapons and generate momentum towards elimination.
ICAN was awarded the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize for our “work to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons” and our “ground-breaking efforts to achieve a treaty-based prohibition of such weapons”.