ASIA-PACIFIC REGIONAL MEETING ON DISARMAMENT IN KATHMANDU, 9 - 11 MARCH

ASIA-PACIFIC REGIONAL MEETING ON DISARMAMENT

IN KATHMANDU, 9 - 11 MARCH

NEW YORK, 2 March (Department for Disarmament Affairs) -– The Department for Disarmament Affairs, through its Regional Centre for Peace and Disarmament in Asia and the Pacific, will convene the thirteenth regional disarmament meeting in Kathmandu from 9 to 11 March 2001.  The theme of this year’s meeting will be “Prospects for further confidence-building”.

The Regional Centre’s activities, carried out through the organization of regional meetings over the last 13 years, aim at encouraging regional and subregional dialogue to enhance openness, transparency and confidence-building and promote disarmament and security.  The dialogue facilitated by those regional meetings has become known as the “Kathmandu process” and has created a community of practitioners more open to regionwide thinking and acting in the field of disarmament and security.

As the first regional disarmament meeting to be held in the new millennium, the meeting will focus on an overview of security environment and prospects for further confidence-building in the subregions of North-East Asia, South-East Asia, South Asia and Central Asia.  The Korean peninsula, including the activities of the Korean Economic Development Organization, will also figure prominently in the debate.  The meeting will also discuss denuclearization and non-proliferation in the region.  At the same time, the meeting will address emerging issues for disarmament, such as organized crime and terrorism, information technology and national security, and disarmament and environment.

Approximately 35 participants from government, academic and research institutes and non-governmental organizations, mainly from the Asia-Pacific region, are expected to attend the three-day meeting in their personal capacity.  It will be entirely financed from voluntary contributions of Member States and interested organizations.

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