CONFERENCE ON DISARMAMENT CONCLUDES 2006 SESSION

The Conference on Disarmament, the world's sole multilateral forum for disarmament negotiations, today concluded the third and last part of its 2006 session after adopting its annual report.

In its report, which will be presented to the General Assembly, the Conference said that the substantive debates during the 2006 session were based on the joint proposal of the six Presidents of the Conference. As envisaged in the proposal, experts from capitals participated in focused structured debates. The report also states that considering the developments detailed in this report, and with a view to commencing early substantive work during its 2007 session, the Conference requested the current President and the incoming President to conduct consultations during the intersessional period and, if possible, make recommendations, taking into account all relevant proposals, views presented and discussions held.

The Conference on Disarmament works by consensus and cannot undertake new work without the agreement of all its Member States. This is the tenth year that the Conference has been unable to agree on its programme of work and to start substantive negotiations.

During the session, the six Presidents held focused structured debates on the agenda items, namely on cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament, prevention of nuclear war, including all related matters; prevention of an arms race in outer space; effective international arrangements to assure non-nuclear-weapon States against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons; new types of weapons of mass destruction and new systems of such weapons, radiological weapons; comprehensive programme of disarmament; and transparency in armaments.

Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations, in his message to the Conference at the beginning of the session, said States needed to prove that the Conference was capable of carrying out its mandated role as the world’s single negotiating forum for multilateral disarmament. Last year’s session had made it clear that the impasse could not be broken by procedural means, or fine-tuning existing proposals. Capitals needed to thoroughly reassess attitudes towards the Conference and develop a new political consensus on priorities in arms control and disarmament.

The Secretary-General addressed the Conference in person on 21 June, saying that the United Nations of the 21st century was determined to move forward on three fronts simultaneously – security, development and human rights. The challenge of the Conference was to rise to the security part of that mission, and help ensure that security policies really did make the world safer and more peaceful -- not threatening whole societies with annihilation, but making human rights and development more attainable for all. Mr. Annan urged the Conference to put differences and well-rehearsed arguments behind it, and rise to the task, adding that if any single group had the collective power to wake the world up to the danger of increased nuclear weapons and nuclear terrorism, it was the Conference on Disarmament.

The following dignitaries addressed the Conference during its 2006 session: Kang Kyung-Wha, Director-General for International Organizations at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade of the Republic of Korea; Kim Howells, Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of the United Kingdom; Manouchehr Mottaki, Foreign Minister of Iran; Ki-Moon Ban, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade of the Republic of Korea; Akiko Yamanaka, the vice-minister for Foreign Affairs of Japan; U Nyan Win, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Myanmar; Roberto Garcia Moritan, Secretary of Foreign Affairs of Argentina; Tariq Rauf, Head of the Verification and Security Policy Coordination of the International Atomic Energy Agency; and Yohei Kono, Speaker of the House of Representatives of Japan. Sergei Lavrov, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, sent a letter to the Conference.

The Conference decided that the dates for the three parts of its 2007 session will be from 22 January to 30 March for the first part; 14 May to 29 June for the second part; and 30 July to 14 September for the third part.

Member States of the Conference

The 65 members of the Conference are Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Cameroon, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Cuba, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ecuador, Egypt, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Malaysia, Mexico, Mongolia, Morocco, Myanmar, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Peru, Poland, Republic of Korea, Romania, Russian Federation, Senegal. Slovakia, Spain, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, Venezuela, Viet Nam and Zimbabwe.

Observers to 2006 Session

The Conference allowed the following States to participate in its work as observers: Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Ghana, Greece, Guatemala, Holy See, Jordan, Kuwait, Latvia, Libya, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Madagascar, Malta, Mauritius, Oman, Philippines, Portugal, Moldova, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovenia, Sudan, Thailand, Timor-Leste, former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, United Arab Emirates, Uruguay and Zambia.

For use of the information media; not an official record

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