So what really happens at a General Conference of the IAEA – the International Atomic Energy Agency?
Delegates from 168 countries converge on the HQ of the IAEA in Vienna. They hold many meetings; and, after a week, most of them return to their countries.
But why?
It’s always difficult explaining what diplomats do. It’s even harder when those diplomats congregate at technical-sounding international organisations such as the IAEA. This year, we have produced a short video on the IAEA’s annual General Conference to set out what it and the IAEA do: here it is. I recommend it, including the Kraftwerk-style soundtrack composed and performed by one of our in-house media gurus.
As a leader in #nuclear energy, the UK supports the key role of the International Atomic Energy Agency @iaeaorg #GlobalBritain pic.twitter.com/uvvAgN6bKj
— UK Mission Vienna (@UKMissionVienna) October 6, 2016
At this year’s IAEA General Conference, the UK delegation was led by Robin Grimes, the Foreign Office Chief Scientific Adviser, and supported by the UK Mission in Vienna. Our key themes were to highlight the UK’s commitment to civil nuclear energy; its efforts to work with the IAEA to ensure that nuclear applications can flourish through robust safety, security and emergency preparedness; and our commitment to the international non-proliferation architecture – in other words, preventing the spread of nuclear weapons.
Discussion during the Conference focused on issues such as nuclear security (helping to prevent nuclear materials being stolen); safeguards (how to stop nuclear materials from civil nuclear power being diverted for use in weapons programmes); nuclear safety (preventing accidents in nuclear power stations); and technical co-operation (how the IAEA can use nuclear technology, such as the sterile insect technique or the measurement of soil moisture content, to boost the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals).
In the course of the week we had many discussions on all of these and many other subjects, and agreed resolutions – this year, all by consensus – to steer the important work of the IAEA.
It’s a big, meaty agenda. By the time the General Conference closed, at 22.45 on the Friday evening, good progress had been made and the IAEA was ready to embark on the year ahead.
I’m already looking forward to the General Conference this time next year in 2017. Watch this space.