As per recently published Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) Yearbook 2015, the number of nuclear weapons in the world decreased in 2015.
The overall stockpile of nuclear weapons has declined to 15,850 in early 2015 from 16,350 in early 2014.
Key facts from SIPRI yearbook
- Main countries possessing nuclear warheads are modernizing their arsenal.
- Reason behind the decrease in the number of nuclear warheads is because of reduction of them from two main nuclear powers United States and Russia.
- Currently Russia has 7,500 number of nuclear warheads compared to 8,000 in 2014. While, US had 7,260 nuclear warheads compared to 7,300 in 2014.
- Till date nine countries possesses approximately around 15, 850 nuclear weapons.
- They are United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea.
- Of these all nuclear weapons around 1800 weapons are kept in a state of high operational alert.