Brasilia, April 7th 2011 - The Frente Nacional de Prefeitos (FNP) invited Mayors for Peace to the Brazilian capital for their 59th General Meeting. Nearly 100 Brazilian Mayors elected the new FNP board. The new FNP Board was welcomed by President Dilma Rousseff.

Mayors for Peace had also the opportunity to discuss future co-operation with the Associação Brasileira de Municípios (ABM) and the Confederação Nacional de Municípios (CNM).  The proposal to increase Mayors for Peace membership up to one thousand Brazilian Mayors before the end of 2011 has been welcomed by both the FNP and ABM.

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The Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLA) organized a packed All-Ireland Forum addressing the nuclear disasters in Fukushima and Chernobyl, as well as the total elimination of nuclear weapons. The NFLA is a local government association based in the City Hall of Manchester (UK), a long-time Mayors for Peace Vice-President City. The NFLA campaigns against both military and civilian nuclear hazards. A presentation by representatives from the 2020 Vision Campaign International Secretariat was welcomed by the audience.  Ireland, which is not member of NATO, has played a historic role to advance the establishment of a nuclear weapon free world.

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Mayors for Peace announced today that 140 new member cities have joined during the month of March 2011. This is the largest monthly growth ever recorded since the association was founded in 1982.

Today Mayors for Peace counts 4,680 local governments in its growing network present in 150 countries and regions. The network, Presided by Hiroshima Mayor Dr. Tadatoshi Akiba, campaigns for the total elimination of nuclear weapons by 2020. The enormous growth of the network is explained by hundreds of population centres being targets and threatened with nuclear annihilation.

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In front of a packed audience of government officials, NGO representatives and media, Mayors for Peace presented the petition, which calls on the leaders of all nation states to “free innocent children and global citizens from the threat of nuclear weapons” by starting immediate negotiations for a nuclear-weapon-free world.

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Mayors for Peace’s Representative to the UN Office in Geneva urged diplomats to negotiate legally binding negative security assurances (NSAs) with a view to achieving total nuclear disarmament.

During the historic meeting with NGO representatives, which was chaired by Canadian Ambassador Marius Grinius, Mayors for Peace representative Esteban Ramirez-Gonzalez, reaffirmed the view of over 4,500 mayors from around the world, that “Cities are not targets” and reminded diplomats that “nuclear-armed states have the responsibility of providing legal protection against the effects, both direct and indirect, of potential nuclear confrontation.”

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On February 10, Orlando, Florida joined Mayors for Peace with a moving public ceremony at City Hall.  The signing ceremony was a high point of the 7th Annual Orlando Latin American Film & Heritage Festival (OLA Fest). Opening the ceremony, OLA Festival organizer Nelson Betancourt, described it as a “sacred occasion.”

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Dakar (Senegal) -  Mayors for Peace received the unanimous support of the FAL Network (Forum of Local Authorities for Social Inclusion and Participatory Democracy) in the final declaration of the IX Assembly meeting in Dakar, Senegal on February 8th, 2011. The meeting of the FAL Network coincides with the World Social Forum.

The fundamental aim of FAL is to turn cities into important actors in the process of globalization. Mayors for Peace is also gaining increasing support from Mayors across Senegal.

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In January, the 2020 Vision Campaign Secretariat in Ypres was lucky enough to receive a visit from Wolfgang and Brigitte Schlupp-Wick, a German couple who recently undertook a six month international cycle tour to campaign against nuclear weapons.

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