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States Gather for 11th NPT Review Conference
April 2026
By Daryl G. Kimball and Libby Flatoff
Representatives from most of the 191 states-parties to the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) will assemble in New York for a month-long conference to assess implementation of the treaty and seek agreement on a final document that outlines action steps to advance its core principles and objectives.
The April 27-May 22 meeting will be held amid multiple challenges to the treaty, which is the foundation of global efforts to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, to further the goals of nuclear disarmament, and to promote cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy under effective international safeguards.
The conference president, Do Hung Viet, who is also Vietnam’s ambassador to the United Nations, said in an interview with Arms Control Today that the treaty “is facing a lot of strain, but it is still extremely important that we work to … rebuild the credibility that the NPT has and the trust that the international community has in the NPT and in a multilateral rules-based framework in general.”
The tensions and divisions among certain NPT members were on full display at last year’s NPT preparatory conference, which set the stage for the review conference. These included disagreements over the ongoing Russian war on Ukraine and its effect on the Ukrainian nuclear energy infrastructure; concern from the United States and some allies about China’s buildup of strategic nuclear forces; criticism of the forward deployment of U.S. tactical nuclear weapons in Europe and Russia’s decision to deploy some of its nuclear weapons in Belarus; and the failure of the five NPT nuclear-armed states to engage in negotiations on disarmament as required under Article VI of the treaty. (See ACT, June 2025.)
Since then, new problems have emerged, and new crises have erupted. In October, U.S. President Donald Trump threated to resume nuclear testing “on an equal basis” and in February, senior State Department officials accused China of conducting a nuclear test in 2020. In February, the 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty expired, which could allow the United States and Russia to increase the number and diversity of their strategic nuclear arsenals for the first time in decades. In response to concerns about Russian aggression and U.S. support for European security, France announced that it will increase the size of its nuclear arsenal and work closely with certain European states to increase cooperation on nuclear deterrence. (See ACT, March 2026.)
The U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iranian nuclear sites in June 2025 and their full-scale attack on Iran launched Feb. 28 have complicated the task of resuming international inspections of Iran’s sensitive nuclear activities while the widening regional conflict raises new concerns and tensions for NPT states-parties.
Weeks before the 2022 NPT Review Conference, Russia invaded Ukraine. Speaking days before the February Israeli-U.S. attack on Iran, Viet told Arms Control Today that “the NPT and the NPT review conference are not in a vacuum. They are impacted significantly by externalities of what’s going on around the world.”
Despite the growing geopolitical conflicts and tension, Viet and other NPT states-parties continue to prepare for the high-stakes review conference with four regional consultations and other engagements.
On Feb. 17, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control and Nonproliferation Christopher Yeaw declared that “the NPT RevCon is high-priority for this administration.”
Yet, unlike the past several review conferences, the U.S. delegation will not be led by a Senate-confirmed, ambassador-level diplomat. The head of the U.S. delegation will be John Zadrozny, who was recently appointed to be the new chief of staff for Undersecretary of State for International Security and Arms Control Thomas DiNanno.
For their part, the Chinese Foreign Ministry convened a March 23-24 event on “promoting multilateralism and advancing arms control diplomacy” in Beijing involving roughly 20 ambassadors and diplomats from a variety of NPT states-parties. Viet, as well as the director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Mariano Grossi, and the UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, Izumi Nakamitzu, also participated.
A week earlier, Grossi, Viet, and Robert Floyd, executive secretary of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization attended the semiannual Moscow Nonproliferation Conference, organized by the nongovernmental Center for Energy and Security Studies, which provided opportunities for engagement with senior Russian officials.
Pressure on NPT diplomats to deliver a successful outcome at the review conference is high but expectations are low. The 2010 NPT Review Conference was the last one that successfully adopted a consensus outcome document. In 2015, consensus on the final document was blocked by the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada over language on how to advance a Middle East WMD-Free Zone. (See ACT, June 2015.)
In 2022, states agreed on a final outcome document covering a wide range of difficult issues, only to see Russia block consensus over language relating to nuclear safety issues at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant following Russia’s invasion earlier that year. (See ACT, September 2022.) The dynamics among the NPT’s five nuclear-armed states are a significant variable in every review conference, but any one state or bloc of states can raise concerns that can significantly affect conference.
Viet told Arms Control Today that in order to improve the chances for diplomatic progress, “I intend to … be a bit innovative without being disruptive … so as to allow all delegations, no matter how big or small, to be able to participate in all of the meetings, in all of the discussions.”
He added: “I intend to prepare a draft to be presented to state-parties earlier on, maybe in the middle of the second week of the conference. That will allow the main committees to start discussions surrounding the draft outcome document, and allow, basically, a bit more than two weeks for the negotiations of such outcome document.”
“An outcome document will show to the world, our constituencies, our people, that they can still rely on the NPT for their security, and that they can be confident that governments are still working towards ensuring better security for all through these dialogues and discussions and sticking to the commitments that they have,” Viet said. Without such an outcome, “We may lose the credibility of the NPT itself, and the review process.”