By way of its international flag day in which 140 German cities and municipalities take part, the worldwide association Mayors for Peace calls for the commencement of negotiations on a treaty banning nuclear weapons.
Hannover has been a member of Mayors for Peace since 1983, since which time it has provided one of the worldwide vice-presidents. Lord Mayor Stefan Schostok: "Only the abolition of all nuclear weapons can protect us against the risk of their being used in a conflict."
The flag day serves to remind of the legal opinion of the International Court of Justice commissioned by the General Assembly of the United Nations and dated 8 July 1996, according to which the deployment – and even merely the threat of deployment – of nuclear weapons constitutes a violation of fundamental principles of international humanitarian law.