(Rev. Chris J. Antal has accepted the invitation –below – to be an honorary money counter and invites you to join him in this effort during the United Nations High Level Conference on Nuclear Disarmament from May 10 to 16.)

 

The Rev. Chris J. Antal

Minister, Unitarian Universalist Congregation at Rock Tavern

Dear Rev Antal,

We invite you to join us as an Honorary money counter in Count the Nuclear Weapons Money, and exciting action taking place in New York City from May 10-16 in conjunction with the UN High Level Conference on Nuclear Disarmament.

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists recently moved the Doomsday Clock to 2 minutes to midnight, indicating the increasing risks of a nuclear conflict. In addition, the nuclear-armed countries are spending over $100 billion per year on nuclear weapons and their delivery systems. These are funds that are sorely needed for other economic, social and environmental needs.

From May 14-16, the United Nations will hold its first ever UN High-Level Conference on Nuclear Disarmament to address this issue. Count the Nuclear Weapons Money is being organized in support.

Over seven days and nights from May 10-16 we will count out $1 trillion (in one million notes each of $1million value) – which is the nuclear weapons budget for the next 10 years. While counting, we will highlight what this money could instead cover.

The action is part of a global campaign Move the Nuclear Weapons Money, which includes efforts to cut nuclear weapons budgets, encourage divestment from the companies manufacturing nuclear weapons and their delivery systems, and reallocate these budgets and investments to meet economic, social and environmental need – such as ending poverty, protecting the climate, supporting renewable energy, creating jobs, and providing adequate healthcare, housing and education for all.

Honorary money counters are invited to count for 15-30 minutes and use this platform to highlight areas to which they believe the money should instead be allocated.

If you would like to be an Honorary money counter, please register online or email us letting us know on which date and time you would be interested in participating.

We look forward to your reply and hope that you can join us for this exciting action in New York.

 

Respectfully yours,

Gene Seidman, Project Manager, Count the Nuclear Weapons Money

Holger Gūssefeld, Special Projects Officer for the World Future Council

Alyn Ware, Global Coordinator of Parliamentarians for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament

and the rest of the Count the Nuclear Weapons Money Team

Ben Cohen, Co-founder of Ben and Jerry’s Ice-cream

Jonathan Granoff, President of the Global Security Institute

Marzhan Nurzhan, Convener of the Abolition 2000 Youth Network

Rob van Riet, Climate Change Program Director, World Future Council