Sharing Best practice globally: Asia Pacific Regional Workshop on Fostering Solidarity for Arms Regulation and Security Cooperation

Photo credits: Nonviolence International Southeast Asia

Phnom Penh, Cambodia, 26–27 November 2025 - Illicit arms flows and arms smuggling undermine peace, security, and development in Southeast Asia and the wider Asia Pacific. Despite progress made by ASEAN Member States, legal ambiguities and uneven enforcement continue to create vulnerabilities.

Regional efforts such as the ASEAN Declaration on Combating Arms Smuggling and the Regional Roadmap on Weapons Regulation in Asia Pacific provide important frameworks to address these challenges.

On 26–27 November 2025, the Ministry of Interior of the Kingdom of Cambodia, as the ASEAN Voluntary Lead Shepherd on Arms Smuggling, and Nonviolence International Southeast Asia (NISEA), co-organized the Asia-Pacific Regional Workshop on Fostering Solidarity for Arms Regulation and Security Cooperation in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

Delegates/experts from ASEAN Member States – Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, The Philippines, Thailand, as well as South Asia and Pacific participants from Sri Lanka, Palau, and Papua New Guinea attended. The ASEAN Secretariat, UNSCAR, UNODA, UNRCPD, UNIDIR, UNDP SEESAC and other international and civil society partners participated and made substantive contributions to the discussions.

The workshop was supported by the UN Trust Facility Supporting Cooperation on Arms Regulation (UNSCAR) and built on the outcomes of the June 2024 Phnom Penh Workshop on Confidence-Building Towards Multilateral Cooperation for Peace and Security Frameworks in the Asia-Pacific.

Discussions covered confidence building initiatives, regional coordination and cooperation around combating arms trafficking.

UNDP SEESAC was invited by the Ministry of Interior of the Kingdom of Cambodia in order to present best practices regarding regional cooperation and establishing as well as implementing regional approach such as the roadmap to combat illicit arms trafficking. UNDP SEESAC was also requested to present regarding new technologies including 3D printed weapons and possible approaches regarding the criminalization of illegal 3 D printing of firearms.