{"id":70898,"date":"2016-05-25T07:50:25","date_gmt":"2016-05-25T07:50:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?guid=d8119b90f061aff8d736601ae80da69e"},"modified":"2016-05-25T07:50:25","modified_gmt":"2016-05-25T07:50:25","slug":"press-release-dstl-hosts-19th-chemical-weapons-demilitarisation-conference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?p=70898","title":{"rendered":"Press release: Dstl hosts 19th Chemical Weapons Demilitarisation Conference"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"govspeak\">\n<p>The destruction of chemical weapons is a high priority under the Chemical Weapons Convention (<abbr title=\"Chemical Weapons Convention\">CWC<\/abbr>). The 19th Chemical Weapons Demilitarisation (<abbr title=\"Chemical Weapons Demilitarisation\">CWD<\/abbr>) Conference, to be held in London on 25-27 May, will provide an opportunity for experts from all over the world to discuss their progress and co-operation in eliminating chemical weapons, and the technical challenges that remain. This year, Foreign and Commonwealth Office Minister Tobias Ellwood will deliver a keynote address at the conference.<\/p>\n<p>The <abbr title=\"Chemical Weapons Demilitarisation\">CWD<\/abbr> conferences have been held annually around the world since 1998, shortly after the <abbr title=\"Chemical Weapons Convention\">CWC<\/abbr> came into force, banning chemical weapons. This year\u2019s event will be attended by the Director-General of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (<abbr title=\"Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons - the international organisation responsible for the Chemical Weapons Convention\">OPCW<\/abbr>), Ambassador Ahmet \u00dcz\u00fcmc\u00fc, and representatives from the USA, Japan, the People\u2019s Republic of China, and several other countries.<\/p>\n<p>Discussions will focus on the progress made by national <abbr title=\"Chemical Weapons Demilitarisation\">CWD<\/abbr> programmes, destruction technologies, and the technical challenges of carrying out destruction in unusual and demanding circumstances such as those in Syria. Participants will also look at explosive detonation technology, chemical safety and security, recovery of chemical weapons from rivers and seas, and innovative technologies.<\/p>\n<p>Ambassador Ahmet \u00dcz\u00fcmc\u00fc, Director-General of the <abbr title=\"Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons - the international organisation responsible for the Chemical Weapons Convention\">OPCW<\/abbr>, said:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA priority for the <abbr title=\"Chemical Weapons Convention\">CWC<\/abbr> is to complete the elimination of chemical weapon stockpiles. We are now moving into the final phase of this work, with over 92% of the world\u2019s declared stockpiles now destroyed. The focus of international efforts will then move to preventing the re-emergence of chemical weapons. The <abbr title=\"Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons - the international organisation responsible for the Chemical Weapons Convention\">OPCW<\/abbr> is already planning for this, but we still have a number of important challenges to overcome before we can reach this stage.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI welcome the important role that the <abbr title=\"Chemical Weapons Demilitarisation\">CWD<\/abbr> Conference continues to play in supporting international efforts to destroy chemical weapons, and contributing to our shared goal of a world free of chemical weapon threats.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"contact \" id=\"contact_1970\">\n<div class=\"content\">\n<h3>\n<abbr title=\"Defence Science and Technology Laboratory\">Dstl<\/abbr> Media Enquiries<\/h3>\n<div class=\"vcard contact-inner\">\n<div class=\"email-url-number\">\n<p class=\"email\">\n              <span class=\"type\">Email<\/span><br \/>\n              <a class=\"email\" href=\"mailto:press@dstl.gov.uk\">press@dstl.gov.uk<\/a>\n            <\/p>\n<p class=\"tel\">\n              <span class=\"type\">Media enquiries<\/span><br \/>\n              01980 658666\n            <\/p>\n<p class=\"tel\">\n              <span class=\"type\">Out of hours<\/span><br \/>\n              07901 892660\n            <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) hosts an international conference supporting global efforts to eliminate chemical weapons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70898"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=70898"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70898\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=70898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=70898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=70898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}