Salam in Munich: Lebanon advocates for nuclear weapons-free region

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam stated on Friday that "Lebanon's steadfast position, along with all members of the Arab League, is to call for a region free of nuclear weapons and all weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East," in a statement following his meeting with the director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, Melissa Parke, in Munich, Germany, where he has been since Thursday.

In a message on X, Salam said such a position "is all the more important today, in light of wars around the world, and given the worrying increase in budgets allocated to armament and in the manufacture of nuclear warhead missiles, which had been declining since the mid-1980s."

The head of the Lebanese government is in Munich to attend the 62nd Munich Security Conference, which is held annually in the city from Feb. 13 to 15. His meeting with Parke took place on the sidelines of this event.

"I also assured [Parke] that Lebanon, which was one of the first countries to vote in favor of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in 2016, will continue to vote for decisions that encourage countries to join this treaty," he continued.

At the regional level, Israel, whose nuclear capabilities remain shrouded in secrecy, has never signed this treaty.

Iran, though a signatory to the document, is regularly accused by its enemies, particularly Israel and the United States, of seeking to acquire nuclear weapons.

Currently, there is a standoff between Tehran and Washington over the nuclear issue: negotiations are ongoing, but if they fail, a U.S. strike on Iran cannot be ruled out.