From the 26th-29th of June, the Younger Generation Leaders Network (YGLN) met in Vienna for their annual gathering. Over the course of the week, YGLN members met with various international organisations and diplomatic missions, fostered insightful discussions, and were able to network and collaborate with one another. Read the commentary for a full account of the annual gathering.
One year on from the death of Jina Mahsa Amini at the hands of Iran’s morality police, which sparked unprecedented protests across the country in support of women’s rights, Dr. Azadeh Zamirirad calls for European decision-makers to take a feminist approach to their foreign policy with Iran and in their response to Iran’s feminist uprising.
In our latest commentary from our New European Voices on Existential Risk (NEVER) network, Michaela Higgins Sørensen explores and refutes the claim that young people are not interested in the nuclear space and calls for the sector to provide the appropriate support for young people to engage in the world of nuclear disarmament successfully.
Following the US decision to send cluster munitions to Ukraine, Mary Wareham and Kasia Derlicka-Rosenbauer write that countries that have endorsed their ban have a collective responsibility to end the human suffering caused by these weapons. To protect the convention’s gains and strengthen its impact, they outline three steps that state parties and supportive sates can take.
On the 21st of July, the ELN co-hosted a private screening of Christopher Nolan’s critically acclaimed film ‘Oppenheimer’ with a range of peace and security partners. We asked nuclear policy experts in attendance what they made of the film and its relevance for arms control, non-proliferation, and nuclear threats today.
Although Sweden’s pending NATO membership is a move in the right direction for enhanced stability in the Euro-Atlantic zone, President Erdogan’s perceived “triumph” in setting the terms of Swedish membership could have serious operational and strategic challenges for NATO in the future, writes Nima Khorrami.
Nicholas Moulios, from the ELN’s New European Voices on Existential Risk (NEVER) Network, has written the ELN’s first commentary as part of this project. He explores the capabilities of OSINT systems for assessing and mitigating potential nuclear disasters, and how these emerging technologies can be harnessed to improve existential risk resilience in Europe and beyond.
Russia’s war against Ukraine has exposed critical flaws in the international nuclear realm. Valeriia Hesse writes that to prevent the total erosion of the non-proliferation norm, a realistic and pragmatic approach towards gradual nuclear arms reductions must be pursued. Ahead of the NPT PrepCom, she outlines concrete steps that the international community can take to build a stronger and more resilient nuclear order.
The integration of neural networks into NC3 poses a multitude of risks to global security. Alice Saltini writes that to pave the way for a moratorium, NPT State Parties should use the PrepCom to focus discussions on understanding the risks associated with integrating deep learning models into nuclear decision-making.