1. The Republic of Korea’s Ambassador to the Netherlands Lee Yun-young has been named as Chairman of the 23rd Conference of the States Parties of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), scheduled to take place in November 2018.

° Ambassador Lee will be formally appointed to serve one year as Chairman of the 23rd Conference of the CWC States Parties, which will bring together the 192 States Parties, international organizations and civic groups, immediately after the Conference kicks off in November 2018.

※ The CWC, composed of 192 States Parties including the ROK, is an international convention that prohibits the development, acquisition, production, retention, transfer or use of chemical weapons.

※ The Conference of the CWC States Parties, the highest decision-making body of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), is authorized to oversee the election of the members of the OPCW Executive Council; the appointment of the OPCW Director-General; fiscal contributions from States Parties; and budget affairs.

2. The ROK’s chairmanship of the Conference of the CWC States Parties will mark the first in twenty years since its service as chair of the third Conference in 1998. By serving at the post, the ROK is expected to see its standing enhanced in the OPCW, the organization at the forefront of nuclear disarmament efforts, as can be seen from it having been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize 2013 in recognition of its contribution to the elimination of most of the chemical weapons across the world.

※ The OPCW is an international organization founded to help implement the CWC.

° With the appointment of Ambassador Lee as Chairman of the 23rd Conference of the CWC States Parties, which came after the election of Paik Jin-hyun as President of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) in October, Lee Byong-hyun as Chairman of the Executive Board of UNESCO in November, and Kwon O-gon as President of the Assembly of States Parties of the International Criminal Court in December, the ROK is expected to see its role expanded on the multilateral stage.


* unofficial translation