On 19-20 September 2002 the IISS hosted a workshop entitled 'Trans-Atlantic Dialogue on Proliferation' at its offices in London. The workshop, which was sponsored by the W. Alton Jones Foundation, brought together senior officials and experts representing the EU, France, Germany, NATO, the Netherlands, Russia, Switzerland, the UK, and the US to discuss ways to strengthen trans-Atlantic cooperation for dealing with today’s most urgent proliferation threats.
The conference opened on September 19 with welcoming remarks by Dr Gary Samore, IISS Senior Fellow for Non-Proliferation, followed by an overview of issues by the US Assistant Secretary of State for Nonproliferation, John Wolf, the Director of International Security at the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, William Erhman, and Gilles Andréani of Cour des Comptes. The panel discussed overarching topics such as threat assessments and the range of instruments available to the international community to counter proliferation threats.
The workshop proceeded with a number of sessions focusing on various geographical regions, especially key countries of concern in the Middle East, South Asia, and East Asia. Participants also discussed proposals to expand cooperative threat reduction programmes with Russia and measures to strengthen international non-proliferation regimes. Issues addressed included regional security dilemmas and arms control requirements, ways of boosting credibility of international non-proliferation agreements and organisations, the G8 Global Partnership against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction, compliance and verification, sustainability of assistance, national implementation and legislation, and how to target non-state actors through non-proliferation regimes.
In addition to the U.S. Department of State and the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, official participants included representatives from the British Ministry of Defence, the French Ministry of Defence, the German Federal Foreign Office, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the European Commission, and NATO. Non-governmental organisations and institutions included Carnegie Endowment, Carnegie Moscow Center, Center for Policy Studies in Russia, The Economist, Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique, Geneva Centre for Security Policy, Mountbatten Centre for International Studies at the University of Southampton, the Non-Proliferation Policy Education Center, the Nuclear Threat Initiative, the Reves Center of the College of William and Mary, the Scowcroft Group, Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik, University of St. Andrews, and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
