Press Room

(United Nations, New York) Nearly a year after the start of a UN process to negotiate a new global arms trade treaty, 192 states came close to agreement on a treaty to require better regulation of the global nuclear arms trade and to set common-sense standards for arms transfers.

(United Nations, New York) Nearly a year after the UN launched a process to negotiate a new global arms trade treaty, states are coalescing around a final treaty text.

(Washington and New York) Major U.S. humanitarian and arms control organizations, including Amnesty International USA, Oxfam America, Arms Control Association, and United to Prevent Genocide, are pressing President Barack Obama to work with other countries close the remaining loopholes in text of the Arms Trade Treaty now under negotiation.

(Washington, D.C.) Today, the first consolidated draft text of a global Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) emerged from arduous negotiations at the United Nations. Governments have just three days to narrow any remaining differences before the conference concludes on July 27.

The following piece was originally published in The Christian Science Monitor on July 9, 2012

Each year, hundreds of thousands of civilians around the globe are slaughtered by conventional weapons that are sold, transferred by governments, or diverted to unscrupulous regimes, criminals, illegal militias, and terrorist groups. The enormous human toll from the unregulated trade of conventional arms undermines international security and impedes economic and social development.

Given the infrequency of serious, direct talks with Tehran on its disputed nuclear program, the failure to achieve a diplomatic breakthrough in Moscow this week is disappointing but not surprising. At the same time, there was no breakdown and there will be follow-on technical talks in Istanbul on July 3.

(Washington, D.C.) As Congress debates defense spending and deficit reduction, observers have pointed to U.S. nuclear weapons as a target for budget cuts. Yet, there has been disagreement about the actual costs of nuclear weapons, and estimates vary. Now, using a new methodology, an article in the June issue of Arms Control Today, the journal of the Arms Control Association, finds that the United States spends about $31 billion on nuclear weapons annually, or about 50 percent more than official estimates.

(WASHINGTON, D.C.)—As part of a growing global campaign to build support for an effective and robust international agreement to regulate international arms deals, more than fifty organizations are urging President Barack Obama to “spare no effort to seize the historic opportunity to negotiate a robust, bullet-proof Arms Trade Treaty (ATT).”

(Washington, D.C.) Next week, diplomats from the P5+1 group of states (China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States) will hold a second round of talks with senior Iranian officials in Baghdad to discuss the Iranian nuclear program. The May 23 round of negotiations are expected to focus on Iran's enrichment of uranium to 20 percent and improved cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency.

(WASHINGTON, D.C.)—Representatives of various groups advocating nuclear arms reductions, presented a petition with over 50,000 signatures to the White House. The appeal--circulated between February and April--urges President Obama to reduce the role and number of nuclear weapons as he makes a once-in-a-decade decision on Presidential nuclear weapons policy “guidance.”

(Washington, D.C.) At the May 20-21 NATO summit in Chicago, the alliance is expected to approve and release its Deterrence and Defense Posture Review (DDPR) report. The DDPR was launched following the previous NATO summit to determine the proper mix of nuclear, conventional and missile defense assets for the alliance.

After a long delay, serious negotiations to resolve concerns about Iran’s nuclear ambitions and its growing capacity to enrich uranium appear to be back on track. Though no breakthrough was achieved, the April 14 round of talks with Iran in Istanbulestablished a good foundation for progress.

More than 50 world leaders met recently in South Korea to address the challenges posed by the buildup and spread of nuclear weapons. As President Barack Obama noted, success depends on a multilayered strategy, including implementation of a global, verifiable treaty banning nuclear weapons testing.

The press recently reported that the Pentagon is preparing options for President Barack Obama as part of the Nuclear Posture Review implementation study. The mere notion of restructuring U.S. nuclear forces unleashed panicked reactions from Capitol Hill’s most ardent nuclear weapons enthusiasts.

Arms Control Association Executive Director Daryl G. Kimball was interviewed by NPR's Mike Shusters on the upcoming P5+1 negotiations in Istanbul, Turkey.

(Washington, D.C.) For the first time in 15 months the P5+1 (China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) will hold talks with Iran on its nuclear program in Istanbul April 14. The meeting is expected to be the beginning of a series of talks rather than a single session over the weekend. The talks are likely to focus on Iran's enrichment to 20% as a confidence-building step toward broader progress on resolving the nuclear issue.

This week at an international nuclear security summit in South Korea, President Barack Obama's private request to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev for "space" on his proposal for cooperation on missile defense was overheard from a live microphone and grabbed the headlines.

For Immediate Release: March 28, 2012

(Washington, D.C.) The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) will release a major new technical report on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) this Friday March 30. The report will assess the U.S. ability to maintain its nuclear arsenal without nuclear test explosions and the ability of the international monitoring system to detect clandestine tests.

(Washington, D.C.) An independent report released today ahead of the March 26-27, 2012 Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul finds that states are on track to meet most of the national commitments they made in 2010 to improve the security of nuclear-weapons usable materials worldwide, but that more work, political will, and financial resources are still required to address the ongoing challenge of safeguarding nuclear material.

In the 20 years since the end of the Cold War, successive U.S. and Russian presidents have gradually reduced the size and salience of their enormous nuclear stockpiles, which remain by far the largest of any country. Nevertheless, the size of each country's arsenal far exceeds what is necessary to deter nuclear attack by the other or by one of the world's other nuclear-armed states.