UN Geneva - Multimedia Newsroom : UNIDIR Press conference: 2026 Arms Trade Treaty Monitor report

Thank you for your patience and good afternoon and welcome to the press launch of the Arms Trade Treaty Monitor 2026 Annual Report.

My name is Paul Holtam and I'm the head of the Conventional Weapons Programme at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research, or UNIDIR for short.

Unity's Conventional Weapons Programme provides policy, relevant research, advisory services and capacity building tools to prevent and address the illicit proliferation and misuse of conventional arms and ammunition, with the goal of reducing human suffering.

We also support the development, implementation and universalisation of international and regional conventional weapons instruments.

So, for example, Unity convened informal consultations and conducted research to support the negotiations towards the Arms Trade Treaty, and we continue to contribute to efforts to implement and universalise the Treaty.

And we hope that our work contributes towards a more responsible international arms trade, countering diversion the illicit trade and increases transparency, builds confidence between States and reduces human suffering.

Therefore, Unidare is delighted to support the press launch of the Arms Trade Treaty Monitor 2026 Annual Report.

This is the first time we've supported a press launch for this Monitor, but it compliments the support we provide for the annual press launches for the Monitor reports on cluster munitions and landmines.

And it's just one way in which Unidic cooperates with civil society, academia, research institutes and the media to increase transparency on the international arms trade.

Turning to the ATT Monitor report, it's the flagship annual publication of the ATT Monitor project.

It takes stock of existing practise, creates greater transparency in how the Arms Trade Treaty is implemented, informs the work of conferences of states parties to the Arms Trade Treaty, and ensures accountability for the treaties commitments.

Indeed, the work of the Monitor strengthens treaty implementation and improves transparency in the conventional arms trade.

The expert panel do I'm joined by today will share with you some of the highlights from the 12th edition of the Arms Trade Treaty Monitor.

And I have to start with Dr Andrea Eduardo Verisco, who's the ATT Monitor project lead.

He's coordinated this year's report and co-authored several of the chapters with other members of the ATT Monitor team.

He'll provide an overview of the report and tell us a little bit more about the current state of the Arms Trade Treaty.

Over to you, Andrea.

Thank you very much, Paul.

Thank you for your kind introduction.

Thank you, Unidir, for this opportunity and thank you all.

They are attending this press launch of the ATT Monitor 2026 report today.

[Other language spoken]

For those of you that might not be familiar with the ATT, the Arms Trade Treaty, the the ATT is a treaty that entered into force in 2014 and has two main objectives.

The first is to establish the highest possible common international standards for regulating and improving the regulation of the international trade in conventional arms, and the second is prevent and eradicate the licit trade in conventional arms and prevent their diversion.

[Other language spoken]

As ATT monitor, every year we publish a report that monitors compliance with the Arms Trade Treaty.

In particular, we focus on transparency and reporting provisions, but we look at compliance with the whole treaty.

In the next few minutes, I will walk you through the main contents of our report.

And before doing that, let me say, for those who are interested, that the report is published on the ATT Monitor website and this year we prepared also summaries and policy briefs in different languages.

The report this year is divided into 5 main section sections.

The first is a review of the year and I will talk about it in a few seconds.

Second, our thematic chapter this year focuses on the Arms Trade Treaty and explosive weapons in populated area.

Also, the acronym goes with EWIPA considerations for risk assessment.

We decided to focus on this topic because we wanted to explore in detail synergies between the EWIPA political declaration and the ADT.

Furthermore, this year the one of the working groups of the Arms Trade Treaty focused on risk assessment, so we wanted to explore more if and how the use of explosive weapons in populated areas is taking into account for states parties when exporting export, exporting arms and assessing export risks.

We're with us Miss Laura Bollo from Article 36 Water, who authored the chapter, and Miss Lubov Hutzel from Humanity and Inclusion who will provide a testimony from Ukraine, which is a conflict that now lasted longer than World War One.

The remainder of the report focuses on reporting obligations and transparency.

We have an analysis of 2024 ATT annual reports and a preliminary review of 2025 annual reports as well as ATT initial reports.

We'll hear from my colleague Alexander Mark Steiner later today.

And finally, as every year, we have some country profiles for each of the publicly reported state party.

We show good practise and room for improvement, which we hope could have future annual report submissions.

[Other language spoken]

So how does the ATT Monitor report assess the current state of the ATT in terms of human universalization?

In the last year we had the accession and ratification of two new state parties, Vanuatu and Ecuador.

We know the universalisation has slowed down in recent year compared to the beginning of of the Arms Trade Treaty as it entered into force and we hope that under represented States and region and sub regions including major exporters and importers will be able to join the treaty in the future.

In the chapter, we also provide a review of the work during the intersessional process, which I think is an important recap for all meaningful exchanges that happened during last year.

[Other language spoken]

And finally, we always have a session that takes stock of the ATT vis A vis the current status of the world.

This year we looked at some indicators that could provide some metrics on the achievement of the three purposes of the treaty.

For those who are not familiar with those, I listed them in in this light.

So one of them is contributing to international regional peace, security and stability.

The Peace Research Institute of Oslo recorded in 2025 the highest number of state based conflicts since 1946, with 65 conflicts in 35 countries and an increase in the number of Interstate conflicts.

The second purpose is reducing human suffering.

Civilian deaths in conflict increased last year, and a survey of 23 armed conflicts conducted by the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights warned that the threat to international humanitarian law aiming to limit the effects of war was at a critical breaking point.

The third purpose is promoting cooperation, transparency and responsible actions by state parties, thereby building confidence among them.

As some of you might know, we are facing a general distrust and a decreased engagement in multilateralism combined with an increased military expenditure.

In the last year, we have seen conflict continuing or starting in many regions of the world, from Gaza and Lebanon to the whole Middle East, Sudan, Myanmar, to the eruption of a border dispute between Cambodia and Thailand.

Most of this conflict involves serious violation of international humanitarian law and international human rights law, and states parties of the treaty should assess the risk of these violations before authorising arms transfers.

As conflicts continue in many regions of the world, we are seeing that some states, including ATT state parties, have taken measures and policy decisions to stop or limit transfers of military material to belligerent parties.

This decision are in line with the object and purpose of the Treaty and with the Treaty's obligation, although there were not always primarily or explicitly motivated by the ATT.

States parties of the ATT this year will be developing A5 year strategy for the Treaty.

We hope then that they can continue to debate arms transfer decisions within the ATT framework and they can offer practical cases that can be used in the ATT strategy to demonstrate the Treaty's effectiveness and impact.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Andrea, for this very helpful scene set up on the Arms Trade Treaty and also some reflections on the the broader international situation.

You mentioned that the the there's a chapter in this year's report on the Arms Trade Treaty and the political declaration on explosive weapons in populated areas, As you said, a weeper for short.

And I'm curious to hear more about the linkages that your research team has identified, because indeed, United's Conventional Weapons programme is also interested in the implementation and universalisation of both of these instruments.

And it's great that we have two presenters here to unpack this chapter and explore these linkages between the ATT and the use of explosive weapons in populated areas.

So we have Mr Lubov Hutzel, Advocacy and communications senior officer at Humanitarian, Humanity and Inclusion, Kiev, Ukraine, and also Miss Laura Wyatt, Director of Article 36.

So Miss Witzel coordinates humanity and inclusions, advocacy and communications work in Ukraine with a focus on strengthening the protection of civilians and ensuring the rights of persons with disabilities in the context of armed conflict.

She also, and that's I guess why she's making the linkages, promotes the universalisation and implementation of several arms control and disarmament instruments.

And we feel that her testimony is important today as it comes from an area affected by conflict where we're seeing the use of explosive weapons, plus many other conventional arms.

She'll tell us more about the widespread use of explosive weapons in populated areas and their impact on civilians and local infrastructure.

And I'm also delighted we're joined by Miss Laura Boyo of of Article 36, with whom we've worked only weep in the past.

And Laura's work focuses upon explosive weapons in populated areas, humanitarian disarmament, and also civilian protection.

And she'll tell us a little bit more about the implementation of the Arms Trade Treaty and how it can take into account the documented humanitarian consequences of the use of explosive weapons in populated areas.

And I think very helpfully, some practical steps that states can take to help strengthen the export risk assessments in implementing the Arms Trade Treaty.

Over to you, I think first, Laura Oliva, please.

[Other language spoken]

Across the world, whenever explosive weapons are used in cities, towns or villages, it is always civilians who suffer the most.

Ukrainians unfortunately one of the clear and painful example of this reality.

The world in Ukraine has brought a level of civilian harm and destruction not seen in Europe since Second World War.

Russia systematically carries out combined strikes across Ukraine using long range weapons such as cruise and ballistic missiles together with drones.

Massive base of attacks, hundreds of drones and disease of missiles launched simultaneously cause significant civilian casualties, destroy energy and medical infrastructure and create an atmosphere of constant terror near the front line.

The actually and guided aerial bombs continue devastated hospitals, schools and residential buildings.

FPV drones are used for targeted hunting of civilians, a vacation, buses and ambulances.

In addition, official sources have documented cases where missiles and drones disperse mines and submunitions for the committing contaminating Ukrainian land and exposing civilians to additional dangers from explosive remnants of war.

In recent days alone, we have witnessed yet another series of brutal attacks, civilians killed and injured in a strike of busy shopping mall in the city of Kriwerich, and repeated waves of massive missile syndrome attacks on Kiev, Zapariza, Herson, Sumi, residential districts and critical infrastructure.

These incidents are not exceptions.

They reflect the ongoing pattern of violence that shapes daily life across the country based on humanity and inclusion work In Ukraine, the widespread use of explosive weapons in populated areas has has had devastating consequences for civilians and the infrastructure they rely on.

This second slide.

Second, can we back a bit?

Since 2022, explosive weapon in populated areas have been a leading cause of civilian casualties in Ukraine.

The UN has verified 16,874 civilians killed, including 820 children, and more than 51,000 injured, including 3126 children.

These numbers represent real people, grandparents who couldn't flee, children injured while playing, people with disabilities left behind in buildings that become targets.

And I know from my own experience that this is no safe, safe place anywhere in the country.

Every region lives under the constant threat of attack.

[Other language spoken]

Weapons also devastated essential infrastructure.

More than 14% of Ukrainians housing Ukrainian housing stock has been damaged or destroyed.

By early 2026, Ukraine had lost nearly half of electricity generation capacity.

Last winter, millions endured freezing temperatures without heating, lighting or water.

The health system has been continuously targeted with over 3000 attacks only since the beginning of this year.

Confirmed education has also suffered.

3600 schools damaged, 400 totally destroyed in the next region, over 80% not longer functioning.

Imagine a child trying to study in a classroom where the windows have been shuttered again and again.

Or a mother giving birth in a hospital where the power, heating and equipment fail after repeated strikes.

This is the these are not isolated incidents, they are our daily reality.

[Other language spoken]

Between January and May 2020, six, 164,000 people were newly displaced, adding 3.7 million internally displaced and 6,000,000 refugees abroad.

People were forced to abandon everything, their homes, their communities, their history.

I spoke with dozens of victims who relocated to several regions.

Their greatest pain is emotional, belonging to their abandoned home, their land and their identity.

Livelihoods have collapsed.

One in four households in in the front lines area is in extreme need, struggling to access food and clean water.

[Other language spoken]

Focus on ensuring that victims can access life saving assistance, cash support, mental health and psychological services, and physical rehabilitation while strengthening protection for the most vulnerable and advancing inclusive humanitarian action.

Today I'm speaking not only as a humanitarian professional, but as a woman who has lived for fifth year under constant tension, fearing for the lives of my loved ones.

In Kiev, shelter covers only around 2% of residents.

Each morning when I am leaving my child's school, I carry out the bite of knowing that safety is not guaranteed.

The school shuttle is just a regular basement, it will not protect in case of direct heat.

There is no Peace of Mind for anyone in Ukraine under the hope that today will not bring another tragedy.

The evidence is clear.

Explosive weapons in populated area cause catastrophic civilian harm, destroy essential infrastructure and during long lasting effects for generation.

Protection of civilians is not only a humanitarian imperative, it's a legal and moral obligation.

[Other language spoken]

Good afternoon, everyone.

So I'm going to look at the connection between the Arms Trade Treaty and the political declaration on protecting civilians from the use of explosive weapons in populated areas.

I think the main point I want to make is this, which is that governments have an opportunity to prevent harm to civilians at the point that they're making decisions around the export of arms.

As such, I need to act on documented risks before weapons are transferred and not wait until civilian harm has already happened.

One of the biggest drivers of harm to civilians in contemporary armed conflicts in the world today is the use of explosive weapons in populated areas.

When towns and cities are bombed, we see an impact that lasts well beyond the initial blast.

People killed and injured, homes and hospitals are destroyed.

Water, sanitation, health, energy and education services collapse.

We heard just now about the impact in Ukraine.

Another example is what we've seen over the last few years in Gaza, which demonstrates both the scale and the foreseeability of this harm.

In the report that we're launching today, we record an incident where a 2000 LB bomb.

Was used and hit jabali, A refugee camp, in October 2023 it killed at least 126 civilians, including 69 children.

This 2000 LB bomb is likely to kill anyone around 30 metres around the point of detonation.

There's lethal fragments that are projected from 2000 LB bombs up to 365 metres away.

So these are really very heavy weapons that are being used in densely populated areas.

The purpose of citing this evidence is not just to demonstrate the humanitarian consequences, but also to ask what exporting states have done with the growing body of information about recipients states conduct and their knowledge around the characteristics and the effects of these heavy weapons and their likely use in populated areas.

[Other language spoken]

So I want to make three points.

The first is that foreseeable harm must be incorporated into these arms export decisions.

Article 7 of the Arms Trade Treaty requires a forward-looking assessment of whether exported arms could be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law.

If there's an overriding risk, the export must not be authorised.

We see that the documented and foreseeable consequences of using heavy explosive weapons in towns and cities must be systematically factored into Article 7 risk assessments before authorisation and not retrospectively.

There's an example that we show in the report, which is around the United States decision in May 2024, which illustrates, I think, both recognition of the connection between these two issues, but also the limits of current practise.

So the United States paused a shipment of approximately 3502 thousand pound and 500 LB bombs because of concerns that they could be used in military operations in densely populated Rafa.

That decision connected both the weapons characteristics, their likely use and anticipated risk to civilians.

But the restriction was limited.

It applied just to the 2000 LB bombs.

It came after extensive harm had already occurred, and it was subsequently reversed and substantial, substantial US transfers to Israel has continued.

These other states have put in place measures as well around exports restrictions to Israel in relation to Israel's use in Gaza.

They show that arms transfer policies can be applied in response to documented civilian risk.

The problem is that in too many instances, we're seeing these restrictions being put in place too late after the fact, and there's not enough connection being made between the knowledge of the effects of these weapons and the use in populated areas and export decisions.

[Other language spoken]

So many of the states that have signed up to the Arms Trade Treaty are also signatories to the political declaration on protecting civilians from explosive weapons in Populated Areas.

We've got 81 countries that are party to the ATT either as state parties or as signatories, and they've also endorsed the the political declaration.

Yet too often these two instruments are still being implemented through disconnected policy processes.

The Explosive Weapons Declaration strengthens recognition around the knowledge and of the harm that's caused to civilians when explosive weapons are used in populated areas.

This knowledge should be used and applied for existing Article 7 assessments through the Arms Trade Treaty, including patterns of civilian casualties, infrastructure damage, knowledge around weapons with wide area effects, the recipient conduct and whether proposed mitigation has worked in practise.

[Other language spoken]

And the Third Point I want to make is that governments should show their decision making in in their arms export decisions.

[Other language spoken]

At the moment, most governments provide little explanation as to how evidence of civilian harm was weighed, what mitigation was proposed, or why a transfer was either authorised or denied or suspended.

There is some good practise, however.

New Zealand explicitly refers to the need to protect civilians from explosive weapons in populated areas and it's and the Political Declaration in its export assessment criteria.

The Netherlands publishes information on licence denials and the reasons underpinning these, and it's really important that governments show this reasoning.

It means that the public are able to then see what evidence of foreseeable civilian harm was genuinely considered before an arms transfer was approved.

So in conclusion, I think the main point really is that states already possess extensive evidence about the civilian consequences of explosive weapons in populated areas.

And as both an established legal framework for access assessing transfer risks, they need to connect these two together, documented patterns of harmony to better shape export decisions before weapons are transferred and not only after the consequences have become impossible to ignore.

[Other language spoken]

It's very helpful to make sure we don't look at the different international commitments and obligations in silos, but look for practical ways to bring them together.

I, I think you've helped us to think that through.

And it's also, of course, particularly important for, again, emphasising the direct and reverberating effects, the humanitarian consequences of the use of transferred weapons in populated areas in conflict, and particularly looking at how the evidence of harm can be used to prevent it moving forward.

You signalled also in your last remarks, Laura, about transparency.

It's an issue that we focus a lot on at Unity, and it's also an issue that Miss Alexandra Marksteiner, the Research Associate for the ATT Monitor, focus upon in this year's Monitor.

She's worked on this topic and will tell us more about the trends that the ATT Monitor has been able to observe in States Parties practises with regards to transparency and reporting on transfer controls and international arms transfers.

Alexandra, over to you.

Thank you very much, Paul.

And as you rightly indicated, analysing the reports that states parties to the ATT submit every year on their arms transfers is basically the ATT monitors bread and butter.

We go through this exercise every year and we have been able to build a vast data sets on which we can base our analysis.

So what I'll do today is I'll share a few trends that we have observed in the data over the past year.

[Other language spoken]

For those of you who might not be as familiar, there are two reporting obligations under the ATT.

So as per Article 13.1, states parties have to submit an initial report on measures undertaken to implement the terms of the treaty.

They're also required to update this report when national control systems change.

On top of that, states parties have to submit an annual reports on their exports and imports of arms during the preceding calendar year.

They can select whether these reports are made public or whether they're just shared with other states parties to the treaty.

They may also exclude information that is commercially sensitive or has implications for national security.

[Other language spoken]

So the question becomes are states actually reporting?

A total of 94 states or 81% have submitted their initial report to the ATT Secretariat.

However, of these, only 7 have updated their initial report.

More than half of all initial reports are older than nine years and are beginning to become outdated.

When it comes to the annual reports pertaining to 2024 transfers, 77 States Parties or 68% have submitted their reports.

However, only a third fully complied with the reporting obligations by submitting public and on time reports for transfers that were either authorised or delivered in 2025.

So far, 70 States Parties or 61% have submitted their annual reports.

The on time reporting rate for 2025 dropped from 44% to just 40% this year.

[Other language spoken]

So this graph shows the reporting rate over the years.

As you can see, the rate has decreased from its peak value of 87% in 2015 to 68% in 2024.

And while the number of States parties has increased, the number of reports continues to hover somewhere in the high 70s.

So that's why the overall reporting rate has decreased.

But I do have to nuance this a little bit by our internal cut off date.

We actually had more reports this year than last year.

So it's not all bad.

But when we will look at the graph, 2024 just looks like the lowest value since quite a few overdue reports were received during the past year.

[Other language spoken]

However, one development that we do find rather concerning is the decrease in the number of meaningfully transparent reports.

For 2024, only 26 States parties or 23% submitted reports that were sufficiently detailed to meet our threshold of meaningful transparency.

And this is the lowest level that we've recorded since the treaty entered into force.

Also, I should mention that close to 1/3 of reporters keep their report confidential and do not make them publicly available.

[Other language spoken]

Here's the trend in meaningfully transparent reports that I just talked about.

[Other language spoken]

In 2015, almost half of reports were detailed enough to be considered a meaningfully transparent.

And now for 2024, it's less than 1/4.

[Other language spoken]

At this point, I do want to recognise that there are a few States parties that go above and beyond, and based on our analysis, a total of 16 States parties went beyond the minimum that was required of them and thereby contributed to a higher standard of transparency.

There was one state in particular, Peru, that stood out for submitting the most consistently detailed report.

[Other language spoken]

Here we have a map that shows how different States Parties reported in 2024.

The most transparent reporters are shaded in in dark green.

Those that complied with their reporting obligations and submitted A meaningfully transparent report are shown in, let's call it medium green.

And then yellow is for those that provided meaningfully transparent reports but we're not compliant.

In most cases, that's because they missed the reporting deadline.

Those that were just compliant but not meaningfully transparent are in light green and dark grey signifies both non reporters and those states that submitted a report but neither complied with their obligations nor met the criteria for meaningful transparency And white shows the non states parties to the ATT.

[Other language spoken]

So just to conclude my remarks, a quick summary of of the trends I've outlined.

When it comes to initial reporting, the compliance rate is relatively high, but it is beginning to stagnate and as time goes on, these initial reports are becoming less informative since more than half of them are older than nine years and may not accurately reflect existing national control systems.

Also, more than 1/4 of these initial reports are private and therefore not accessible to the public.

As for the annual reports on arms transfers, states parties are submitting more overdue reports, which is a promising development, but unfortunately, reporting is becoming less detailed on average.

But to end this on a high note, 2025 marked the very first submissions by the Central African Republic in Togo.

So at least that's something.

And with that, I hand the floor back to Paul.

Thank you, Alexandra, and thank you for trying to end on a high note, despite the fact that I think there's a lot of concerning messages regarding meaningful transparency and some gaps that you highlighted in the presentation.

And and which I have to say echo the results and the findings of a couple of Unity reports this year on worrying trends in reporting and transparency with regard to international transfers of small arms like weapons and some worrying implications for international trust and confidence building.

So with the final presentation delivered, I'd now like to open up the floor for any questions from the room or online.

We have had four very informative presentations, but I'm sure they've provoked questions, queries from you.

So I'll look online and I'll look in the room.

If there is anybody that wants to open the questions and break the ice.

I see Isabel Sacco of FA.

[Other language spoken]

I work for the Spanish News Agency.

I would like to ask about the talking about transparency, If you can say something on the level of transparency showed by European countries.

Europe is a region where the the defence expenditures has increased as you know in the since few years.

So how are they reporting on their exports?

Also secondly on the, I see that the countries like China or Brazil, especially those those didn't report on, on their exports.

Is this a common trend of for these countries they usually don't don't report And also well, please just as these two and maybe I will have some follow-ups.

[Other language spoken]

Thank you Miss Sakov for breaking the ice.

And of course, we'd welcome further questions.

So we have one question in the room, but please don't be shy online also.

[Other language spoken]

Alexandrobo, AFP on the same, on the same subject.

It's striking that for 2025, only 40% of the state parties have delivered their reports.

[Other language spoken]

And also 2024, only 23% were considered as meaningfully transparent.

Could you explain us the criteria used to determine whether a report is considered as meaningfully transparent or not?

And have you already estimated the proportion of transparent reports for 2025, please?

[Other language spoken]

With those four questions, I'll pass over to Alexandra.

Thank you very much for your questions and I'll just go ahead and address those in order.

So Isabel, you, you asked about the, the reporting practises of of European states.

Europe is one of the regions with the highest universalization rate to the ATT, meaning that most countries in Europe are states parties to the ATT.

And if you go to our report, you can have a look at the at the map that I had previously showed in in my slide, but you'll see that actually many of the world's most transparent reporters are located in Europe.

Just to name a few, we have the Netherlands, we have Poland, Czech Republic, Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and, and a few others.

And, and most countries in in Europe also submit annual reports.

A few of them missed the deadline.

So that just means that they weren't fully compliant with their with their reporting obligations.

You also pointed out Brazil and China.

I I know it might be a little confusing in the map because they're shaded in in dark grey.

It does not mean that they did not report.

It just means that they did not report publicly.

So their reports for for 2024 are in a restricted part of the ATT website that can only be accessed by other states parties and and not by the public.

So we as, as, as researchers that rely on, on open sources are not able to access that information.

And then we had a question in in the room about what exactly meaningful transparency means.

Again, this is outlined in, in, in the report, but I'll just go through it quickly.

We have 5 criteria that states parties need to fulfil in order to, to, to pass that threshold.

One, they have to submit the report publicly.

2, they have to provide information that is disaggregated by weapon type.

So we want to know how many battle tanks, how many warships, how many rifles, how many revolvers, etcetera, etcetera were were transferred.

They also have to name their trading partners.

So exactly where did those weapons go or from who were they imported?

Then we'd like to know whether the transfer data that they include in their reports concerns authorizations or actual transfers.

There is there is a difference in in those authorizations are are at times higher than actual transfers.

And then last but not least, they have to provide the number of units or the financial value for their transfers that they report.

If they fulfil all five of these criteria, then they are deemed meaningfully transparent.

Unfortunately, we have not yet been able to conduct this analysis for 2025.

We usually do this at a later time in the year just to give states parties a chance to, to submit their reports even if they're late, because then we can go through all of them at once.

So I'd, I'd urge you to to keep up with us next year.

We'll have the answer to your question.

[Other language spoken]

We'll try if I can add a couple of points.

First to Isabel in relation to the data from the European countries, the European Union Group on Conventional Arms Export, so-called Co ARM actually publishes data on licences on exports from European states.

So to reiterate what Alex was saying, those countries are among the most transparent in terms of publishing their licences for exports.

And to the gentleman in the room regarding meaningfully transparent, I know when when when we discuss this with with people who are new and not too familiar to to our methodology, it can become a bit confusing.

But it's basically an index of quality of how many disaggregated information we could find in the report.

So issues like states aggregating all the recipients together doesn't give us any response on how many items went to.

[Other language spoken]

So we, we came out with this methodology a few years ago and we updated every year.

We look at the meaningfully transparent reports, but we also look at the past reports to see if in the meantime others report have been submitted and therefore the numbers become a bit higher for the past years.

What we do, we the ATT has a deadline for annual reporting, which is end of May.

We don't do the end.

So by end of May 2026, states had to report on 2025 transfers.

We don't do that analysis now.

First, because we, we, we have time limits before publishing, but also because we don't have sufficient number of of data points and of reports, we usually have 4050 report.

So we put the deadline that we are after.

In this way we can, we can make a better and more meaningful analysis of of the report.

[Other language spoken]

Thank you, Alexandra and thank you also Andrea.

I don't see any other questions yet online, so I'll let you buy some time and give two questions to to Lubov and Laura.

Actually given the the work that we've done in my own personal interest to to Laura, it would be quite interesting.

I think you were very helpful in terms of giving some practical suggestions on what we can do with international instruments and connecting them with the Weeper.

Are there any other sort of suggestions that you have in terms of measures that we can do for exploiting these synergies and, and making connections?

And, and you above also, it was very helpful, I think for us to have the perspective on the, the indirect and reverberating effects, not just the civilian deaths and casualties, but the impact on infrastructure.

And so I'd be interested to to give you the opportunity to elaborate a little bit perhaps on sort of the changes in your daily life that have been affected by this constant use of explosive weapons.

And maybe you first, Laura.

[Other language spoken]

I mean, I think there's two real values around international agreements like the Arms Trade Treaty as well as the political declaration on explosive weapons in populated areas.

The 1st is that international agreements like this seek to set new international standards, norms and standards that need to be adhered to, ideally by all of the states that signed on to it, but also more broadly.

We often see these treaties and these agreements having an impact beyond the states that have signed on to them.

So in the case of the Arms Trade Treaty, it creates new standards around the trade in weapons around the world.

And with the explosive weapons declaration it reinforces both the expectation that civilian harm should be anticipated, but also that it needs to be reduced.

And within that it has a key commitment aimed at restricting use of heavy explosive weapons in populated areas of towns and cities.

There are other international agreements relevant to conventional weapons, for example, prohibitions on anti personnel land mines and cluster munitions, weapons that have particular wide area effects and they're especially harmful to civilians.

And these have had enormous positive benefits over the years that they've been put in place due to these prohibitions.

The second I think benefit from these international agreements is how states apply them nationally.

And this is really where their value lies in enacting the international standards and rules and translating that international action.

So on these issues, I think what we want to see happening is putting in place clear export criteria.

This means recognising that explosive weapons in populated areas causes harm in the same way that New Zealand has done and and factoring that into arms export criteria so that they're not transferred to states where these weapons will be used in towns and cities.

There's other steps that states can take, including development of national protection of civilians policies, changing of military doctrine, particularly around urban warfare, and better regulating use of explosive weapons in populated areas, as well as training and changing to to operational practises.

So these are, I think, areas where we see these two instruments being able to inform each other and strengthen protection of civilians.

[Other language spoken]

Thank you both for your question.

So when we're talking about the explosive weapon in populated area, we often operate with a number of civilian casualties or with a statistic of destruction.

But for every Ukrainian is a primarily the measure of daily existence and exhausting psychological stress.

As a mother, every day I need to make a decision what no one in the 21st century should have to make.

When I'm hearing a siren of air alert or explosion, I need to decide whether to run to the shelter or whether to stay in in between of two walls holding my child's hand.

Running down the street to the shelter is dangerous.

Staying home is dangerous too.

This feeling of constant fear every when every loud sound makes your heart stop.

This is a life experience for entire generation of children.

My seven years old daughter not remember world without war without sounds of explosion and sounds of sirens.

Each of us, both adults and children, after sleepless nights must return to our usual life, to go to work, to go to school.

And Ukrainians not a priori a nation of super resistant people.

We are forced to live in such a conditions.

Of course, Ukrainians rely on Ukrainian defence system, but we also rely on international community to protect our lives right to live in safe condition in a safe and peaceful world, free from the terror of explosive weapons.

[Other language spoken]

I see Isabel Sacco has her hand up once more, so I'd be happy to give you the the floor again for a follow up questions as promised.

[Other language spoken]

Listen, I what I I think that it would be interesting for as journalists is to understand what this reporting process on ARM exports show about the increase or decrease on global arm sales.

You know what it means for the current conflict situation.

This is one question and the other one is on the how effective are these the measures has been the measures to stop or limit the transfers of arms two places or two parties in in armed conflicts like Israel or it has been also mentioned in the report.

I think Saudi Arabia from your perspective as experts can, what can you tell us about the also the scale of illicit armed transfers compared with the official information that you you have collected?

[Other language spoken]

I think I'll pass it to Andrea first.

Yeah, I I can start and and Alex will add something.

I think there are two elements in in your question.

One is states that that have taken measures to stop some transfers to certain conflict areas and the second is on the scale.

So I will start with the with the first one because we, we, we write about a few examples in the report.

And while I was presenting, I was saying that some states, also states parties took some, some decisions or some policy measures.

We have seen in the last year.

For instance, Switzerland, because of the its principle of neutrality, say that the export of war material to countries involved in the international armed conflict with Iran, including export of war materials to the United States, couldn't be authorised for the duration of the conflict.

In terms of transfers to Israel, we have seen Spain that that approved an arms embargo on Israel, Slovenia that ban arms trade.

[Other language spoken]

The Netherlands halted exports of F35 aircraft components directly to Israel.

Belgium prohibited the transit of equipment for Israel and we also have have heard some policy declarations or position of other states in the report.

Also in the chapter on explosive weapons in populated areas, we also mentioned some litigation cases that happen in relation to Israel, in in the Netherlands, this ongoing and in the past in relation to transfer of arms to Saudi Arabia.

And here I would like to point to the fact that, that the treaty as a normative treaty provides some, some measurements and provides some possibilities to create these legislative cases and this possibility to look into risk assessment and the decision of some of the states when it comes to the scale.

And I will leave it in one second to Alex.

It's, it's, I'll try to make it very, very simple.

If if let's say there are 100 of 100% of transfers in the world, there are different transparency mechanism that try to capture how many transfers or how many exports and imports happen among countries.

There are some other research institutes that try to do it a global level.

There is Aun mechanism called UN Rocca where all states should report on conventional arms transfers.

There are all the categories of the treaties except for small arms and leg weapons.

There is the Arms Trade Treaty.

Now when we look at the at the numbers in the Arms Trade Treaty and when we look at this as an as a non governmental organisation that has only access to the public reports, not to the private reports.

Of course the numbers that we see are only a fraction of this major 100 that I was mentioning before.

Having said that we have some numbers and my colleague can can say more.

[Other language spoken]

Thank you, Andrea.

And yes, I think just to reiterate, we're probably never going to get to 100% capture rate for every single transfer that's that's taken place in the world, especially considering that there are only quote unquote 118 states parties to the ATT.

So we don't cover the entire world, but just to to give you a little bit of an idea of of the numbers that we're talking about, we went through the public reports for 2024 and counted 500,000 exports of major conventional arms and we counted 30,000 imports of major conventional arms.

Why is there this massive gap?

Because many of the world's largest importers of arms are not states parties to the ATT.

When we look at small arms and light weapons, we counted 1.8 million exports and around 600,000 imports for 2024.

So that's just to give you an idea.

As As for how this compares to previous years, it is a slight uptick in in in the figures that we've captured.

So more transfers were publicly reported by states parties in 2024 then in the early twenty 20s.

Hopefully that answers your question.

[Other language spoken]

Thank you for giving the time.

I'd just like to thank all of the authors of the Monitor for excellent expert speakers today and to all of you for your interest, questions and I'm sure continued reading on this issue.

With that, I wish you all a wonderful rest of the day.

And please don't forget to check out the ATT Monitor website and also Unidir's website for additional reading on these subjects.

Thank you for your attention and goodbye.

UNIDIR Press conference: Launch of the 2026 Arms Trade Treaty Monitor report - 25 August 2026