A-list actors urge for ‘a world without nuclear weapons’

WASHINGTON: Alec Baldwin, Matt Damon and John Cusack are among an array of A-list actors starring in a new video urging President Barack Obama to "set the world's course" for an end to nuclear weapons at next week's G8 Summit in Northern Ireland.

"Some argue that the spread of these weapons cannot be stopped, cannot be checked," actor Robert De Niro says in the video.

"Such fatalism is a deadly adversary," Damon responds.

Whoopi Goldberg, Morgan Freeman, Naomi Watts and Christoph Waltz also appear in the two-and-a-half minute spot.

The video was produced by Global Zero, a Washington, D.C.-based grassroots organization whose mission is "to eliminate all nuclear weapons by 2030."

“The message from national security experts and citizens around the world is clear: the only way to eliminate the global nuclear danger is to eliminate all nuclear weapons,” Michael Douglas says. “It's time to set the world's course to zero.”

To do so, Global Zero said in a press release, President Obama "will have to go beyond the bilateral process President Reagan started of U.S.-Soviet/Russian arms reductions and bring the other leading nuclear powers into international arms negotiations for the first time in history."

The group also sent an open letter to Obama recalling a 2009 speech in which the president committed to their cause.

Of course, there are other pressing issues for Obama and Putin to discuss. Namely, Syria, and its deadly civil war.

After authorizing U.S. weapons for Syrian rebels, Obama faces difficult talks with the Russian president, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's most powerful ally.

"There are no illusions that that's going to be easy," Ben Rhodes, the White House deputy national security adviser, told Reuters.

“It’s in Russia’s interest to join us in applying pressure on Bashar Assad to come to the table in a way that relinquishes his power and his standing in Syria,” Rhodes told the Associated Press. “We don’t see any scenario where he restores his legitimacy to lead the country.”