The May issue of Arms Control Today is out. It contains an excellent article by Oliver Meier called “CWC Review Conference Avoids Difficult Issues”.

Oliver highlights some of the difficulties in adopting final text for the declaration. He also brings up the relatively soft emphasis on CW destruction and makes the point that this was complicated by a fundamental debate between developed and developing nations about whether the CWC should be seen as a disarmament treaty or a nonproliferation treaty. Finally Oliver discusses the “hidden debate about incapacitants”. This issue was not specifically on the agenda, nor did it show up in the final declaration; but it did receive considerable debate during the Conference.