Amb. Luiz Filipe de Macedo Soares, Secretary-General of OPANAL, received at OPANAL Headquarters the participants of the 5th edition of the Summer School on Nuclear Disarmament and Non-proliferation.
From 23-27 July 2018, the fifth edition of the Summer School on Nuclear Disarmament and Non-proliferation for young diplomats from Latin America and the Caribbean was held in Mexico City.
The Summer School is organized every year, since 2012, by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Mexico (SRE), in collaboration with the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS) - Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey and the Agency for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean (OPANAL). The objective of the course is for young diplomats from Latin America and the Caribbean to gain knowledge about nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation of nuclear weapons.
The fifth edition of the Summer School was attended by young people from 30 countries in the region and with the participation of experts in different areas such as disarmament and non-proliferation, including: Dr. William C. Potter (Founding Director of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies), Ambassador Elayne Whyte Gómez (Permanent Representative of Costa Rica to the International Organizations based in Geneva and President of the United Nations Conference that negotiated the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons), Ambassador Luiz Filipe de Macedo Soares (Secretary-General of OPANAL) and Mr. Yamashita Yasuaki (survivor of the atomic bombing in Nagasaki).
At the opening of the Summer Course, the Secretary-General mentioned that "more than 100 young diplomats from Latin America and the Caribbean have had the opportunity to participate in this Course during the last 5 years". Likewise, Ambassador Luiz Filipe de Macedo Soares participated in the panel "Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Cycle: Challenges and Priorities" in which he presented his views on the 2020 NPT Review Conference. At the headquarters of the OPANAL, the Secretary-General presented to the young diplomats his presentation: "The international law of nuclear disarmament: The Treaty of Tlatelolco and other Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones, the NPT, the CTBT and the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons".
In its Declaration issued on 26 September 2017, on the occasion of the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons, the 33 Member States of OPANAL committed to continuing working "for the implementation of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation education programmes, convinced that they are an effective means for contributing to the consolidation of international peace and security".
See the photo gallery.