VCDNP 50d ago

The Permanent Mission of Switzerland to the United Nations and The Vienna Center for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation (VCDNP) hosted a side event on the margins of the 2026 NPT Review Conference on Tuesday, 5 May 2026 at UNHQ, New York. This event presented the findings of a recent VCDNP project focused on negotiating verification across the domains of nuclear arms control, disarmament, and non-proliferation. The project draws on insights from a dedicated expert workshop as well as analysis of past practice in negotiating nuclear verification drawing on the experience of former negotiators and more recent verification concepts and tools. During the side event, speakers discussed key challenges in negotiating verification, such as balancing confidence and intrusiveness, managing sensitive information, and addressing issues of completeness, scope and comprehensiveness of verification. The discussion focused in particular on how different actors define the scope and focus of verification, how trade-offs between confidence and feasibility are managed, and how verification is shaped by political, legal, technical and institutional constraints. Speakers: • Ambassador Matteo Fachinotti, Permanent Representative of Switzerland to IAEA and CTBTO, Switzerland • Mr. Noah Mayhew, Senior Research Associate, VCDNP • Dr. Nikolai Sokov, Senior Fellow, VCDNP