Guinea-Bissau

Nuclear-weapon-free state

Voted in favour of adopting TPNW 

Has signed TPNW, but not yet ratified

Guinea-Bissau has signed but not yet ratified the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

João Ribeiro Butiam Có, the then-minister for foreign affairs of Guinea-Bissau, signed the treaty at a high-level ceremony on 26 September 2018. 

While Guinea-Bissau did not formally participate in the negotiation of the treaty at the United Nations in New York in 2017, it voted in favour of its adoption.


Guinea-Bissau has promoted universal adherence to the treaty, including by co-sponsoring a UN General Assembly resolution in 2019 that calls upon all states to sign, ratify, or accede to the treaty “at the earliest possible date”.

In 2016, Guinea-Bissau was an additional co-sponsor of the UN General Assembly resolution that established the formal mandate for states to commence the negotiations in 2017 on “a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total elimination”.

Guinea-Bissau was among 127 states that endorsed a “humanitarian pledge” in 2015–16 to cooperate “in efforts to stigmatise, prohibit, and eliminate nuclear weapons”. The pledge was instrumental in building momentum and support for convening the negotiations.

Guinea-Bissau is a state party to the 1996 Treaty of Pelindaba, which established Africa as a nuclear-weapon-free zone.


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