{
  "url": "https://openlegislation.uk/eu-decision-2019-938/annex/division-II/division-1",
  "json_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/eu-decision-2019-938/annex/division-II/division-1.json",
  "legislation": "eudn/2019/938",
  "legislation_title": "Council Decision (CFSP) 2019/938 of 6 June 2019 in support of a process of confidence-building leading to the establishment of a zone free of nuclear weapons and all other weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East",
  "legislation_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/eu-decision-2019-938",
  "path": "annex/division/II/division/1",
  "kind": "division",
  "number": "(1)",
  "heading": "Objectives and audience",
  "text": "This project, as noted above, has four objectives:\nTo produce a factual narrative of efforts to establish a ME WMDFZ between 1995 and 2015 that fills an important gap in the research literature and identifies lessons for future efforts.\nTo identify key issues, opportunities, obstacles and ideas of contemporary relevance to consideration of a WMDFZ and efforts to enhance regional security cooperation, thereby contributing insights on substantive as well as process aspects of the zone and potential ways forward in the context of a changing strategic environment.\nTo engage and obtain perspectives and insights from a wide community of researchers, policymakers and academics in the region on these issues and, in so doing, expand the number and diversity of participants exploring the prospects for dialogue and progress on the longstanding issue of a ME WMDFZ in the context of wider regional WMD and security issues as well as other experiences of regional nuclear free zones.\nTo facilitate dialogue among these experts with a view to fostering networks, communication and engagement that could in turn, contribute to future efforts to advance regional security, arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament progress in the region.\nThree overlapping audiences are envisaged:\nInternational security and arms control researchers, particularly those with a focus on nuclear, chemical and biological non-proliferation and disarmament and their delivery systems, regional security or Middle East security issues. A particular focus will be the new generation of scholars that are devoting greater attention to international and regional WMD issues in light of the Syrian conflict, divisions over Iran's nuclear programme and other nuclear capabilities in the region, technological advances and new weapons capabilities, strained political relationships between key nuclear States and controversy between some nuclear and non-nuclear States on the way forward for nuclear disarmament. An authoritative English language account of the trajectory of the ME WMDFZ in the 1996-2015 period would provide an important resource and repository for consideration of a wide range of WMD issues, inter alia, on nuclear-weapon free zones as well as issues specific to the Middle East.\nPolicymakers working on arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament issues. This includes persons with both regional as well as international perspectives and in multiple fora, including the NPT 2020 Review Conference. Many States, regardless of their positions on nuclear disarmament, consider an agreed outcome from this meeting to be critical after the failure of the 2015 NPT Conference to agree on a final document and given multiple stresses on the NPT. The issue of progress toward a ME WMDFZ is acknowledged as a critical variable in the prospects for a Review Conference outcome.\nMiddle East scholars and practitioners that seek to track and understand the rapidly changing dynamics of the region, its Member States and its populations, the implications of shifting alliances and capabilities on regional security and the prospects of preventing and mitigating current and future tensions and conflicts.",
  "extent": "E+W+S+N.I.",
  "status": null,
  "version": "current",
  "annotations": [],
  "outstanding_effects": [],
  "provenance": {
    "source": "legislation.gov.uk",
    "source_url": "https://www.legislation.gov.uk/eudn/2019/938/annex/division/II/division/1",
    "retrieved_at": "2026-11-01T15:12:41.156946+00:00"
  },
  "licence": "Open Government Licence v3.0",
  "licence_url": "https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/",
  "attribution": "Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives."
}