Montenegro deposited its instrument of succession to the Chemical Weapons Convention with the Secretary-General of the United Nations on 23 October 2006. The Convention will enter into force for Montenegro as of 3 June 2006, the date of the nation’s independence. Upon the deposit of its instrument of succession, Montenegro became the 181st State Party to the Chemical Weapons Convention.
The Chemical Weapons Convention entered into force on 29 April 1997. Adherence to the Convention contributes to international peace and security and strengthens international efforts to prevent the proliferation and terrorist acquisition or use of chemical weapons. Universal membership and the effective implementation of the Convention provide concrete benefits to all OPCW Member States in the areas of international cooperation and the peaceful use of chemistry.
The Convention’s implementing agency, the OPCW, aims to achieve four principal objectives: to eliminate chemical weapons, to prevent their re-emergence and spread, to provide assistance and protection upon any State Party’s request in the event of the use, or threat of use, of chemical weapons.
The OPCW is pursuing an Action Plan to acquire the membership of every nation by 2007, ten years after the Chemical Weapons Convention’s entry into force, to ensure that the ban on these weapons is universally applied.
The OPCW urges the 14 States not Party that are yet to ratify or accede to the CWC to do so as soon as possible.
PR86 / 2006