Two-day national seminar on the CTBT is held in Jakarta, Indonesia

A two-day national seminar on the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) was held in Jakarta on 6 and 7 December 2005. The seminar was organized by the Government of the Republic of Indonesia in cooperation with the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO). Sixty-eight participants comprising representatives of the Indonesian Government, members of the Indonesian Parliament as well as representatives of academic institutions attended the seminar. The Executive Secretary of the CTBTO Preparatory Commission, Ambassador Wolfgang Hoffmann, addressed the participants of the seminar, expressing his hopes that the seminar would help identifying the necessary procedures for national implementation of the CTBT and consider possible civil and scientific application of the Treaty's verification technologies. The two-day seminar focused on political, legal and technical aspects of the CTBT. Representatives of the Provisional Technical Secretariat spoke about the political significance of the Treaty; its contribution to regional and international peace and security; the CTBT verification regime and its technologies; ratification procedures of the CTBT; the Treaty's national implementation; training programmes provided by the CTBTO Preparatory Commission and potential civil and scientific applications of CTBT verification technologies. In his closing statement, the Director of International Security and Disarmament of the Indonesian Department of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Hasan Kleib, said that the seminar had clearly contributed to a better understanding of the CTBT and its benefits for Signatories States, thereby reenergizing the effort of the Government to expedite the ratification of the Treaty.