Disarmament

After two weeks of closed-door consultations, a sweeping arms trade treaty text setting out principles and rules to regulate the staggering array of weapons that changes hands each year failed to achieve consensus tonight, but several delegations, not willing to return to their countries “empty-handed”, promised to move the draft treaty to the General Assembly for adoption as early as next week.

With a multi-billion-dollar trade in conventional weapons still threatening the lives of millions of civilians around the world, the time had come for States to overcome past setbacks and deliver on a robust, legally binding arms trade treaty, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told a packed room at Headquarters as the Final United Nations Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty kicked off this morning.

The United Nations Final Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty opens Monday, 18 March, at United Nations Headquarters in New York amid broad expectations of finally arriving at a successful outcome, which had eluded the Arms Trade Treaty Conference in July 2012.

NEW YORK, 5 March (Office for Disarmament Affairs) — The United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs, through its Regional Centre for Peace and Disarmament in Africa is holding an “African Seminar to Prepare for the Final Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty”, in partnership with the International Action Network on Small Arms.

The United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs, in conjunction with the World Future Council, is pleased to announce that the 2013 Future Policy Award will be presented at New York Headquarters just before the start of United Nations Disarmament Week (24-30 October).

NEW YORK, 29 January (Office for Disarmament Affairs) — The twenty-fourth United Nations Conference on Disarmament Issues will take place in Shizuoka City, Japan, from 30 January to 1 February 2013. This annual event is organized by the Office for Disarmament Affairs, through its Regional Centre for Peace and Disarmament in Asia and the Pacific, in cooperation with the Government of Japan, and this year’s host city of Shizuoka.

NEW YORK, 8 January (Office for Disarmament Affairs) — The first-ever Civil Society Forum in support of Security Council resolution 1540 (2004), opening in Vienna today and running until 10 January, is intended to provide opportunities for furthering civil society contributions to national and international efforts to implement the resolution’s key requirements.

NEW YORK, 19 December (Office for Disarmament Affairs) — The Secretary-General of the United Nations recently appointed nine new members to his Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters to replace nine current ones whose terms will end on 31 December.

The Art for Peace Calendar for 2013 comprises 12 winning entries in the Art for Peace Contest 2012, sponsored by the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs and the Harmony for Peace Foundation with the goal of encouraging children and teens across the globe to use their creative talents to “imagine a world free of nuclear weapons”.

Opening its 2013 organizational session, the Disarmament Commission today elected its new Chair and decided to hold its 2013 substantive session from 1 to 19 April, which would kick off its next three-year cycle.