Pandemic Delays CTBTO Leadership Vote

December 2020

Members of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) have been forced to postpone deliberations that were scheduled to take place Nov. 25–27 to select the next head of the organization due to another COVID-19 pandemic-related lockdown in Vienna.

Two candidates are under consideration: current CTBTO Executive Secretary Lassina Zerbo and Robert Floyd, director-general of the Australian Safeguards and Nonproliferation Office. States were to have chosen who would serve as the executive secretary of the $128 million organization as of July 31, 2021, when Zerbo will complete his second four-year term. A new date for the leadership selection meeting has not been chosen.
—DARYL G. KIMBALL