Arms Control and Disarmament projects

Supporting multilateral disarmament verification: the role of international organizations

 

Funder

Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Project updates

  • 16/08/2011: Funds agreed. Project start date.
  • 19/09/2011: Presentation on Mulilateral Disarmament Verification delivered to IAEA General Conference, Vienna.
  • 01/09/2011: Preparations underway for March 2012 seminar on the role of international organizations in disarmament verification.
  • 08/12/2011: Presentation, including aspects of the project, delivered to the CTBTO.
  • 27/01/2012: VERTIC releases briefing paper on 'Multilateral verification: Exploring new ideas', by David Cliff and David Keir.
  • 08/03/2012: Scheduled date for the first workshop.

Background

This project aims to build on the UK-Norway Initiative (on verified warhead dismantlement) by establishing an emphasis on the role of multilateral organizations in disarmament verification.

The project is developed to allow for the effective implementation of action 19 of the Final Document of the 2010 NPT Review Conference. This action notes the agreement of all parties on the importance of ‘supporting cooperation’ amongst a wide range of actors aimed towards ‘increasing confidence, improving transparency and developing efficient verification capabilities related to nuclear disarmament’.

The primary purpose of this project is to engage with multilateral organizations on this matter. 

Key activities

  • VERTIC proposes to convene a series of meetings to investigate the involvement of multilateral organizations in disarmament verification. These meetings would involve predominantly technical personnel from international organizations, states, and non-governmental organizations.
  • In support of these meetings, VERTIC will also be conducting research into areas identified as priorities in order to inform and focus discussions. These research papers and the underlying discussions may also provide jumping-off points for practical research work.
  • We will also produce about three workshop reports, two public briefing papers, and other documentation as necessary.