The 2025 session of the Conference on Disarmament (CD) began this morning under the presidency of Ambassador Leonardo Bencini, Permanent Representative of Italy to the Conference on Disarmament. After eleven years, Italy is again leading the main disarmament body by virtue of a monthly rotation mechanism among the 65 CD member States. Italy’s presidency comes at a difficult moment in international relations and the global architecture of arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation. The CD is the main negotiating body for multilateral disarmament agreements, but it has been in a deadlock for a long time due to the main actors vetoing one another’s initiatives. Positive signs came last year with the establishment, after extended negotiations, of five subsidiary bodies with the aim of preparing the groundwork to relaunch negotiations. However, since the agreement was reached towards the end of the 2024 session, the subsidiary bodies were not able to meet. “We must now reconfirm the 2024 decision,” says Ambassador Bencini. “There is strong expectation that the understanding reached last year can be reconfirmed now by all the main actors. This should not, however, be taken for granted.” In case the subsidiary bodies are reestablished, they will deal with all the main topics on the CD agenda, in particular nuclear disarmament and prevention of nuclear war; a possible treaty to ban production of fissile material; security assurances for non-nuclear-weapon States; prevention of an arms race in outer space. Italy’s presidency will end in mid-February, when Japan will take over.
ITALY ASSUMING THE PRESIDENCY OF THE CONFERENCE ON DISARMAMENT
