The US-Iran agreement proved that nuclear weapons offer no advantage, says the campaign to abolish them

The agreement between the US and Iran to end the Middle East war proves that nuclear weapons offer no strategic advantage, the International Campaign for the abolition of Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) has stressed today.

The NGO expressed hope that governments would "make the right conclusion from a war in which nuclear weapons proved to be both dangerous and strategically ineffective," announced.

The memorandum of understanding to end the war was signed yesterday by US President Donald Trump and his counterpart Iran Masud Pezesbian and sets the foundations for detailed negotiations on the Islamic Republic's nuclear programme and the relaxation of sanctions against Tehran.

ICAN: İran-ABD anlaşması nükleer silahların strategyjik avantaj sağlamadığını gösterdihttps://t.co/z5dJVkwYEa pic.twitter. com/Soi7F9MavC— ANF Türkçe (@anfhaber4) June 18, 2026

ICAN, who won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize for its key role in drafting the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), stressed that the agreement showed how little benefit US and Israel's nuclear arsenals have offered.

"The lesson of this war is exactly the opposite of what nuclear armed states want us to believe," according to ICAN director Melissa Park.

"Two nuclear forces attacked a country without nuclear weapons, and the nuclear forces were forced to stop," the NGO's announcement continued.

It was clear, he added, that "nuclear weapons have brought neither security nor leverage. They just brought the US to the brink of destroying a culture.".

The agreement includes a commitment from Iran "not to acquire or develop nuclear weapons". But this statement simply "confirms what international inspectors had found long before this war: Iran is a state without nuclear weapons," ICAN said.

Mko noted that Iran acceded to the Non-Proliferation Treaty of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) in 1970 and "is legally bound, as a state without nuclear weapons, not to acquire nuclear weapons while subject to the safeguards mechanisms of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)".

ICAN also stressed that "Israel remains the only state in the Middle East with nuclear weapons". This country, he said, has about 90 nuclear weapons and remains outside both NPT and TPNW.

"A lasting peace requires the treatment of the existing arsenal, rather than seeking the compliance of a state that does not have it with these rules," he concluded.