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Better be friends because you are in the same boat
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India, Pakistan should give up nukes: Ted Turner
New Delhi: Calling for universal nuclear disarmament, media mogul and billionaire philanthropist Ted Turner Friday advised India and Pakistan to eliminate all nuclear weapons in the interest of a safe and secure world.
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“India and Pakistan should realistically get rid of all their nuclear weapons. If these bombs go off, it will be the greatest disaster in human history,” Turner said.
He was addressing an interactive session organised here by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).
“You (India and Pakistan) better be friends because you are in the same boat,” Turner told a select group of businessmen, diplomats and journalists.
Making a strong pitch for universal nuclear disarmament, he said: "It’s not just India and Pakistan alone. All countries in the world should simultaneously give up nuclear weapons.
“Imagine thousands of nuclear bombs going off. It will be the end of the world. I don’t want to see humanity extinct. I don’t want to be there to write the epitaph of humanity.”
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CII presented its “Exemplary Social Entrepreneur Award” to Turner, the founder and chairman of the United Nations Foundation.
Turner also met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Friday evening and discussed the UN Foundation’s pet project - polio eradication.
“If we are successful, and we intend to be, it will be the greatest accomplishment in history,” the 67-year-old tycoon said.
Turner exhorted governments across the world to trim their defence spending and use these resources for the UN millennium development goals like the eradication of poverty.
He protested against the increasing trivialisation of news. “I am a strong believer in serious, hard-hitting journalism,” the CNN founder said.
Turner was in India to attend a meeting of the board of directors of the UN Foundation that also includes India’s IT icon and Infosys founder N.R. Narayana Murthy.
The foundation, created by Turner in 1998 with his historic $1 billion gift to the UN, has committed more than $28 million to India’s economic and social development.
It launched the “Pride in India” campaign in 2003 to mobilise resources to address issues of healthcare, environment and sustainable development.
Earlier Friday, Turner participated in a discussion on “Energy and Climate Change Programme” with The Energy and Resources Institute director-general R.K. Pachauri and Jairam Ramesh, MP and a member of National Advisory Council.