OPCW Director-General: “The CWC is now a well recognised legal and moral norm whose violation under any circumstances will not be tolerated by the international community”
The 11th Annual Meeting of National Authorities was held at the OPCW headquarters in The Hague from 27 to 29 November 2009 with 172 participants from 117 States Parties representing all regional groups in attendance.* The Pacific Islands Forum also participated in the meeting.
In his opening remarks to the meeting the OPCW Director-General, Ambassador Rogelio Pfirter, welcomed the four new States Parties that joined the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) during the past year – Lebanon, Iraq, Dominican Republic and the Bahamas – and assured them of the Technical Secretariat’s full support in implementing the Convention’s provisions.
The Director-General noted that with only seven States remaining outside the Convention the Organisation is on the cusp of achieving universality, and that full universality will contribute qualitatively to the accomplishment of the Convention’s objectives. He said the CWC is now a well recognised legal and moral norm whose violation under any circumstances will not be tolerated by the international community, adding that States which remain outside the treaty will find themselves increasingly isolated from the mainstream.
The thematic focus of this year’s meeting was the sharing of experiences in national implementation of the Convention. Presentations were made by National Authorities on lessons learned while roundtable discussions focused on issues involved in organising National Authorities and sensitizing domestic constituencies. The regional groups explored regional perspectives of CWC national implementation and discussed ways to foster sub-regional and regional cooperation. National Authorities also met among themselves and bilaterally with OPCW Technical Secretariat staff to discuss issues of specific interest to individual States Parties.
* Africa – 33, Asia – 31, Eastern Europe – 17, Latin America and the Caribbean – 17, Western Europe and Other States – 19
OPCW News 56/2009