A plan for a safer future

10 July, London.

The Roadmap for a sustainable solution to arms control in the Western Balkans by 2024 was adopted by the region’s leaders at the London Summit in the presence of European Union (EU) leaders.

The Roadmap was developed by the Western Balkans authorities with SEESAC’s technical support under the auspices of France and Germany and in consultation with the EU and all other relevant actors. The adoption of the document is the result of a record-breaking 5 months consultations process started in Podgorica at the high-level meeting, followed by discussions at the local level in all jurisdictions across the region, agreed in Tirana at the 9th SALW Commissions Meeting and adopted at the London Summit.

The Roadmap envisages the Western Balkans as a safer region and an exporter of security where comprehensive and sustainable mechanisms, fully harmonized with the EU and other international standards, are in place to identify, prevent, prosecute, and control the illegal possession, misuse and trafficking of firearms, ammunition and explosives. It is based on regional cooperation principals and it draws upon SEESAC’s signature solution to arms control resulted from over a decade of work on all arms control related aspects with governments in the region and in partnership with the EU.

The Roadmap can be accessed here.

About the London Summit

The Summit was attended by Heads of Government of the Western Balkans as well as representatives of Austria, Croatia, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Slovenia, as well as Bulgaria and Greece and the EU institutions. The Summit was the fifth to take place under the Berlin Process after Berlin (2014), Vienna (2015), Paris (2016) and Trieste (2017). The Berlin Process is a diplomatic initiative that Chancellor Merkel launched in 2014 bringing leaders of the region and EU partners to work together on supporting security, stability and prosperity in the region. https://bit.ly/2HM7NwU

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