Sofia Fruet, Armed Conflict and Civilian Protection Initiative
Every year around this time, the humanitarian disarmament calendar starts to pick up, and this year is no exception. Below is a preview of upcoming multilateral events related to the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), lethal autonomous weapons systems, the Convention on Cluster Munitions, and the Treaty on the Prohibition on Nuclear Weapons, all of which are taking place against a backdrop of ongoing international conflict.
The Convention on Conventional Weapons meeting on lethal autonomous weapons systems will convene at the UN in Geneva from August 31-September 4. Credit: UN Photo | Rick Bajornas, 2016.
The 12th Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty will take place from August 24-28, 2026, at the Centre International de Conférences Genève, in Geneva. Presided over by South Africa, this conference will address matters ranging from treaty implementation and universalization to transparency and reporting to the draft of a five-year strategy for the treaty. Mexico, Spain, and Togo, the gender focal points, are expected to present work regarding the gender-related commitments of Article 7(4) of the ATT, which obligates states parties to assess the risk of arms being used in gender-based violence. Concerns about the ongoing transfers of arms to Sudan and Israel may be raised. Control Arms, the global civil society coalition, is also looking to use this meeting as an opportunity to strengthen the application of human rights due diligence standards to the arms industry, address the weaknesses in the enforcement of the treaty with regards to parts and components, and increase the scope of the ATT, including to emerging weapons systems.
The year’s second meeting of the Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems under the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) will take place from August 31-September 4, 2026, at the UN in Geneva. The GGE will strive to agree by consensus to a report with the elements of an instrument on lethal autonomous weapons systems that it can forward to the CCW Review Conference in November. The draft report is built on a rolling text that high contracting parties have discussed since 2024. The Stop Killer Robots campaign argues that the elements in this document should be strengthened, not weakened, and used as a starting point for negotiations of a legally binding instrument. More than 70 states, including 66 CCW high contracting parties, have said the draft text is a good basis for negotiations. These developments take place against a backdrop of the deployment of autonomous weapons systems to the battlefield in Ukraine, and military AI being used the US in Iran and Israel in Gaza, according to Stop Killer Robots.
Following the GGE, from September 14-18, the Third Review Conference of the Convention on Cluster Munitions will be held in Vientiane, Laos. The location is symbolic given that Laos is the country most contaminated by cluster munitions and hosted the convention’s First Meeting of States Parties. The review conference is expected to produce a political declaration, a five-year review document, and an action plan. The Cluster Munition Coalition (CMC) is calling on the remaining signatories that have not yet ratified to ratify, states parties to uphold the ban “without exception,” and states parties to “intensify outreach” to promote universalization. Preserving language in the final report that condemns “any use of cluster munitions by any actor and under any circumstances” is particularly important given that over the past two years, the weapons have been used in Ukraine and reportedly in Mali, and Lithuania withdrew from the convention. CMC’s Cluster Munitions Monitor is scheduled to be released the week prior to the review conference.
Another review conference—this one for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons—will take place from November 30-December 4, 2026, at the UN headquarters in New York. It will be the first review conference since the treaty went into effect in 2021. The treaty mandates that the conference address its “implementation and status.” Areas of focus and discussion for this review conference may include treaty universalization as well as victim assistance and environmental remediation. As civil society coordinator for the conference, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) has advised that September 11, 2026, is the deadline for organizations to request accreditation. Placing the conference in a larger context, ICAN has stated, “Today, amid renewed geo-political tensions and regional conflicts, the risks of nuclear weapons use are arguably the highest they have ever been since the end of the Second World War. Yet even as some governments signal new investments in nuclear arsenals, a coalition of nations, civil society organisations and international institutions are advancing a different vision, anchored in the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.”
In addition to these issue-specific events, the UN General Assembly’s First Committee on Disarmament and International Security will convene at the UN in New York in the October to address those weapons and others. In the margins of that meeting, civil society will gather for their annual Humanitarian Disarmament Forum, hosted this year by Nonviolence International and Legacies of War, the weekend of October 17-18, 2026, and the first session will be online to encourage greater accessibility.
This post expresses the views of the author does not purport to represent the views of the International Human Rights Clinic at Harvard Law School or Harvard University.
Sofia Fruet, Armed Conflict and Civilian Protection Initiative
Every year around this time, the humanitarian disarmament calendar starts to pick up, and this year is no exception. Below is a preview of upcoming multilateral events related to the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), lethal autonomous weapons systems, the Convention on Cluster Munitions, and the Treaty on the Prohibition on Nuclear Weapons, all of which are taking place against a backdrop of ongoing international conflict.
The 12th Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty will take place from August 24-28, 2026, at the Centre International de Conférences Genève, in Geneva. Presided over by South Africa, this conference will address matters ranging from treaty implementation and universalization to transparency and reporting to the draft of a five-year strategy for the treaty. Mexico, Spain, and Togo, the gender focal points, are expected to present work regarding the gender-related commitments of Article 7(4) of the ATT, which obligates states parties to assess the risk of arms being used in gender-based violence. Concerns about the ongoing transfers of arms to Sudan and Israel may be raised. Control Arms, the global civil society coalition, is also looking to use this meeting as an opportunity to strengthen the application of human rights due diligence standards to the arms industry, address the weaknesses in the enforcement of the treaty with regards to parts and components, and increase the scope of the ATT, including to emerging weapons systems.
The year’s second meeting of the Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems under the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) will take place from August 31-September 4, 2026, at the UN in Geneva. The GGE will strive to agree by consensus to a report with the elements of an instrument on lethal autonomous weapons systems that it can forward to the CCW Review Conference in November. The draft report is built on a rolling text that high contracting parties have discussed since 2024. The Stop Killer Robots campaign argues that the elements in this document should be strengthened, not weakened, and used as a starting point for negotiations of a legally binding instrument. More than 70 states, including 66 CCW high contracting parties, have said the draft text is a good basis for negotiations. These developments take place against a backdrop of the deployment of autonomous weapons systems to the battlefield in Ukraine, and military AI being used the US in Iran and Israel in Gaza, according to Stop Killer Robots.
Following the GGE, from September 14-18, the Third Review Conference of the Convention on Cluster Munitions will be held in Vientiane, Laos. The location is symbolic given that Laos is the country most contaminated by cluster munitions and hosted the convention’s First Meeting of States Parties. The review conference is expected to produce a political declaration, a five-year review document, and an action plan. The Cluster Munition Coalition (CMC) is calling on the remaining signatories that have not yet ratified to ratify, states parties to uphold the ban “without exception,” and states parties to “intensify outreach” to promote universalization. Preserving language in the final report that condemns “any use of cluster munitions by any actor and under any circumstances” is particularly important given that over the past two years, the weapons have been used in Ukraine and reportedly in Mali, and Lithuania withdrew from the convention. CMC’s Cluster Munitions Monitor is scheduled to be released the week prior to the review conference.
Another review conference—this one for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons—will take place from November 30-December 4, 2026, at the UN headquarters in New York. It will be the first review conference since the treaty went into effect in 2021. The treaty mandates that the conference address its “implementation and status.” Areas of focus and discussion for this review conference may include treaty universalization as well as victim assistance and environmental remediation. As civil society coordinator for the conference, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) has advised that September 11, 2026, is the deadline for organizations to request accreditation. Placing the conference in a larger context, ICAN has stated, “Today, amid renewed geo-political tensions and regional conflicts, the risks of nuclear weapons use are arguably the highest they have ever been since the end of the Second World War. Yet even as some governments signal new investments in nuclear arsenals, a coalition of nations, civil society organisations and international institutions are advancing a different vision, anchored in the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.”
In addition to these issue-specific events, the UN General Assembly’s First Committee on Disarmament and International Security will convene at the UN in New York in the October to address those weapons and others. In the margins of that meeting, civil society will gather for their annual Humanitarian Disarmament Forum, hosted this year by Nonviolence International and Legacies of War, the weekend of October 17-18, 2026, and the first session will be online to encourage greater accessibility.
This post expresses the views of the author does not purport to represent the views of the International Human Rights Clinic at Harvard Law School or Harvard University.
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