The agreement between U.S. president Barack Obama and Russian president Dmitry Medvedev to negotiate further nuclear disarmament pushed the issue back to pole position in international politics. Just one of the reasons is the upcoming review of Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) in early 2010.
 
The clock is ticking. Efforts to prevent Iran developing nuclear weapons are running out of time. A nuclear race could break out across the whole Middle East. The six-party talks with North Korea ended in failure. The tensions threaten to escalate, putting regional stability throughout East Asia at risk. If Pakistan fell into the hands of the Taliban, so too would the country’s entire nuclear arsenal. The risk of nuclear anarchy is no longer a distant horror scenario; it has entered the realms of possibility. 

Within the context of these developments, the Heinrich Böll Foundation is holding its tenth Annual Foreign Policy Conference on September 10 and 11. Renowned speakers from international politics, industry and civil society will join us to discuss the dangers posed by nuclear weapons in the 21st century’s multilateral world order. How can we prevent non-state actors, such as terrorists, gaining access to materials that can be used for making nuclear weapons? How can we strengthen the nuclear non-proliferation regime to protect the world from all-out nuclear anarchy?

In the run-up to the conference the members of the online think tank Atlantic-Community.org will develop policy recommendations, that will be discussed in the panels.

This international conference aims to promote multilateral collaboration among existing nuclear powers and emerging economies – based on the shared assumption that we must do all what we can to prevent a global nuclear arms race.