The 14th Annual Meeting of Asia Pacific Safeguards Network (APSN)

The 14th Asia Pacific Safeguards Network (APSN) Annual Meeting held on 31 October – 2 November 2023 in Bangkok, Thailand. This activity is an important forum for APSN member countries to share experiences and best practices in the implementation of safeguards. The meeting is also an opportunity to identify challenges and opportunities to improve the effectiveness of safeguards in the Asia Pacific region. Safeguards are activities to ensure that the use of nuclear energy is only for peaceful purposes.

The theme of the 14th APSN meeting is "Strengthening Safeguards Implementation in Asia and the Pacific." This meeting was chaired by the Government of Thailand Cq. Office of Atom for Peace (OAP) and the Chairman of APSN for the 2023-2024 period.

The event was officially opened by Secretary General - OAP Thailand Pemsuk Sutchaphiwat which was attended by several countries including Australia, Indonesia, Canada, Japan, Laos, Malaysia, Mongolia, Papua New Guinea, South Korea, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Viet Nam, United States and IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency). The meeting began with a Safeguards Seminar by Mohamed Lamari from the IAEA who in his opening delivered:

• During the post-Covid-19 period, several countries have authorized the implementation of modified SQP, namely Brunei, Laos, and Papua New Guinea and Thailand
• The importance of domestic inspections to fulfill reporting obligations and declarations to the IAEA completely and correctly
• The need for understanding of LOF (Location Out of Facilities) operators in IAEA Safeguards obligations
• Fulfillment of export and import control obligations for nuclear materials and equipment related to the nuclear material cycle, especially dual-use items

During the seminar, participants discussed various topics such as Implementation of a state-level approach to safeguards, detection and prevention of undeclared nuclear activities, knowledge and human resource management for safeguards and regional cooperation in safeguards. Here are the key points from the APSN committee meeting on 2 - 3 November, 2023:

• Improved implementation of the State Level Approach to safeguards;
• Detection and prevention of undeclared nuclear activities;
• Increased regional cooperation in safeguards;
• Improved knowledge management and human resource capacity for safeguards:
• Increased use of technology to increase the effectiveness of safeguards;
• Brunei, Laos and Papua as well as Timor Leste applied as APSN members;
• The election of the APSN chairman for 2025 - 2026 to be carried out openly and transparently, it is also proposed that the election of the chairman be based on the alphabetical round flow of the names of member countries

Overall, the APSN committee meeting of 2 - 3 November 2023 is an important step forward in efforts to improve the effectiveness of safeguards in the Asia Pacific region. The recommendations resulting from this meeting will help APSN member states to improve the implementation of safeguards and to better prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.