Where is the Annual Security Review Conference held?

The conference is held in Vienna, AUT.

What is the primary focus of the Annual Security Review Conference?

The conference focuses on contemporary security challenges and fostering international dialogue on global stability.

When does the Annual Security Review Conference begin?

The conference begins on June 17, 2026.

Annual Security Review Conference (ASRC) 2026

Name: Annual Security Review Conference (ASRC) 2026
Start: 2026-06-17T00:00:00Z
End: 2026-06-17T00:00:00Z
Location: Vienna

Jun 17, 2026Vienna, AustriaIn-person

Registration open

The Annual Security Review Conference (ASRC) is a significant international gathering focused on contemporary security challenges. Hosted in Vienna, AUT, this event brings together experts and policymakers to deliberate on critical issues impacting global stability and cooperation. The conference serves as a platform for in-depth analysis and strategic discussions.

Committees & topics

Topics
Regional Security Issues in the OSCE Area · Peace and Security in Europe · A Fair and Lasting Peace in Ukraine · The Future of European Security Architecture · Maintaining Dialogue Channels Amid Confrontation · Reducing Military Risks and Preventing Incidents · Revitalizing Conventional Arms Control · New Technologies and Emerging Threats to Security

Why it matters

The ASRC is crucial for understanding the evolving landscape of international security. In an era marked by complex geopolitical shifts and emerging threats, such forums are essential for fostering dialogue and identifying pathways to collective security. The discussions held here often inform national and international policy, contributing to a more stable global environment.

For diplomats and international relations professionals, the conference offers unparalleled opportunities for networking and gaining insights into the perspectives of various nations. The exchange of ideas among participants from diverse backgrounds enriches the understanding of multifaceted security dilemmas. The outcomes of the ASRC can influence diplomatic strategies and multilateral initiatives aimed at addressing shared security concerns.

The conference's location in Vienna, AUT, a city with a rich history of international diplomacy, underscores its importance as a neutral ground for sensitive discussions. The insights generated from the ASRC are vital for anyone engaged in foreign policy, defense, or international law, providing a comprehensive overview of current security trends and future challenges.

How to prepare

To effectively engage with the Annual Security Review Conference, delegates should undertake thorough preparatory work. This includes a comprehensive review of the current geopolitical climate, paying particular attention to regions experiencing significant security challenges. Understanding the historical context of ongoing conflicts and diplomatic efforts is also critical.

Delegates should consider conducting a detailed stakeholder analysis, as outlined in the Model Diplomat lesson on "what-is-stakeholder-mapping" and "stakeholder-workshop". Identifying key actors, their interests, and potential areas of convergence or divergence will be invaluable. Furthermore, exploring "hidden-stakeholders" can reveal less obvious but influential parties whose perspectives might shape discussions.

Familiarity with various "engagement-strategies" will enable delegates to contribute constructively to debates and bilateral meetings. Developing a "dynamic-analysis" framework for assessing evolving security situations will also be beneficial. Finally, understanding "gender-dynamics-across-cultures" within the context of security can provide a more nuanced perspective on humanitarian and conflict resolution efforts.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 5 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Austria

As the host nation, AUT emphasizes its role as a neutral facilitator for international dialogue on security matters.

Role in topic

AUT provides the venue and diplomatic framework for the conference, promoting open discussion on global security challenges.

Russia

RUS often highlights the importance of traditional security concepts and the role of major powers in maintaining global stability.

Role in topic

RUS is a significant actor in European and global security, and its perspective on arms control and regional conflicts is central to discussions.

United States

The USA typically advocates for international cooperation, democratic values, and addressing emerging threats like cyber warfare and terrorism.

Role in topic

The USA plays a leading role in global security initiatives and its views on alliances, defense spending, and strategic competition are highly influential.

Germany

DEU emphasizes multilateralism, arms control, and humanitarian aspects of security, often advocating for diplomatic solutions.

Role in topic

DEU is a key economic and political power in Europe, contributing significantly to discussions on regional stability and international security frameworks.

Ukraine

UKR's perspective is heavily shaped by its ongoing conflict, focusing on territorial integrity, sovereignty, and international support.

Role in topic

UKR's experiences are central to discussions on international law, conflict resolution, and the implications of geopolitical aggression.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

Regional Security Issues in the OSCE Area

The OSCE region spans from Vancouver to Vladivostok and encompasses some of the world's most volatile flashpoints, including the South Caucasus, the Western Balkans, Moldova/Transnistria, Central Asia, and the broader Black Sea littoral. Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, regional security architecture built in the 1990s — the Helsinki Final Act follow-ons, the Charter of Paris, and the Istanbul Document — has come under unprecedented strain, with Russia suspending cooperation in several OSCE bodies and Western states curtailing engagement. Unresolved conflicts have re-escalated in parallel: Azerbaijan's 2023 operation reasserted control over Nagorno-Karabakh and triggered the exodus of the ethnic Armenian population; tensions between Serbia and Kosovo periodically flare in the north; and Central Asian states navigate the post-2021 Afghan environment alongside contested borders. The Annual Security Review Conference is the OSCE's principal forum for stocktaking across these theaters, evaluating field operations, and considering whether confidence-building tools designed for the post-Cold War order remain fit for purpose in an era of open great-power confrontation.

Key players

Peace and Security in Europe

Europe's security order rests on a layered framework: the UN Charter, the 1975 Helsinki Final Act, the 1990 Charter of Paris for a New Europe, and overlapping NATO and EU commitments. For three decades these instruments underpinned a presumption that borders would not be changed by force and that confidence-building, transparency, and arms control would manage residual tensions. Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014 and full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 ruptured that consensus, prompting Finland and Sweden to join NATO, the EU to adopt unprecedented sanctions packages, and a sustained rearmament drive across the continent. The present debate centers on how to restore predictability without legitimizing aggression. Discussions range from the future of the Vienna Document and the Open Skies regime to the role of the OSCE itself, whose consensus rule has been used to block budgets and mission renewals. European states are simultaneously absorbing the costs of supporting Ukraine, deterring further escalation along NATO's eastern flank, and managing hybrid threats — sabotage, GPS jamming, migration instrumentalization, and disinformation — that fall below the threshold of armed attack.

Key players

A Fair and Lasting Peace in Ukraine

Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022 followed eight years of conflict in Donbas that began with the 2014 annexation of Crimea and the failure of the Minsk I and II agreements. The UN General Assembly has repeatedly affirmed Ukraine's territorial integrity (notably Resolutions ES-11/1 and ES-11/4), and the ICJ ordered Russia to suspend military operations in March 2022. Despite these rulings, Russia has illegally claimed four additional Ukrainian oblasts — Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson — none of which it fully controls. Ukraine's 2022 ten-point Peace Formula emphasizes territorial integrity, withdrawal of Russian forces, accountability for war crimes, nuclear and food security, and the release of deportees, including children whose forcible transfer prompted ICC arrest warrants in 2023. Subsequent diplomatic tracks — the Copenhagen and Jeddah meetings, the June 2024 Bürgenstock summit, and various non-Western proposals from China, Brazil, and African states — illustrate competing visions of what "fair" and "lasting" mean. Core disputes concern sequencing of ceasefire and withdrawal, security guarantees for Ukraine, sanctions relief, frozen Russian assets, and the status of occupied territories.

Key players

The Future of European Security Architecture

European security architecture was constructed in stages: the 1975 Helsinki Final Act established the CSCE's ten principles; the 1990 CFE Treaty capped conventional forces between the Atlantic and the Urals; the 1992 Open Skies Treaty enabled cooperative aerial observation; and the Vienna Document instituted military transparency. This web has progressively unraveled. The United States withdrew from the INF Treaty in 2019 citing Russian violations; the US and Russia both exited Open Skies in 2020–2021; Russia suspended CFE participation in 2007 and formally withdrew in 2023; and New START is set to expire in February 2026 without a successor. Delegates must consider whether to rebuild on existing OSCE foundations, design a new framework, or accept a more fragmented order organized around NATO, the EU, and ad hoc coalitions. Substantive questions include the geographic scope of any new regime, treatment of non-strategic nuclear weapons, missile defense, the role of neutrals such as Switzerland and Austria, and how to integrate cyber, space, and AI-enabled capabilities that the original treaties never contemplated.

Key players

Maintaining Dialogue Channels Amid Confrontation

Even at the height of the Cold War, channels such as the Moscow–Washington hotline, the Helsinki process, and incidents-at-sea agreements provided guardrails against inadvertent escalation. The post-2022 environment has seen many of these mechanisms degrade: the NATO–Russia Council has not met substantively since January 2022, US–Russia strategic stability talks are suspended, and OSCE consensus has repeatedly broken down over chairmanship, budget, and mission mandates. Track 1.5 and Track 2 diplomacy — through think tanks, former officials, and faith-based mediators — has partially filled the gap, as have humanitarian channels brokered by Turkey, the UAE, Qatar, and the Holy See for prisoner swaps and the return of deported children. The debate is whether dialogue should be conditional on behavior or maintained unconditionally as a risk-reduction tool. Proponents of engagement cite the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis lessons and the need to prevent miscalculation around nuclear forces and near-misses involving aircraft and naval vessels. Skeptics warn that premature normalization rewards aggression and undercuts accountability mechanisms, including ICC proceedings and the Register of Damage for Ukraine.

Key players

Reducing Military Risks and Preventing Incidents

Military risk reduction encompasses the practical mechanisms that prevent accidents, miscalculation, and unintended escalation between armed forces operating in close proximity. The toolkit includes the 1972 Incidents at Sea Agreement template, the 1989 Dangerous Military Activities Agreement, NOTAMs and airspace deconfliction, hotlines between operational commanders, and the Vienna Document's notification and observation requirements. Since 2022, dangerous interactions have multiplied — including the March 2023 downing of a US MQ-9 drone over the Black Sea, repeated close passes between NATO and Russian aircraft over the Baltic and Barents Seas, GPS jamming affecting civil aviation, and incidents around the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, which the IAEA monitors under its Seven Pillars framework. The agenda item examines how to restore predictability without formal arms-control treaties. Options include reviving sub-regional confidence-building measures, expanding the IAEA's role at nuclear facilities in conflict zones, formalizing deconfliction lines used in Syria for use elsewhere, and clarifying rules of engagement for unmanned systems whose loss carries lower escalation thresholds than crewed platforms.

Key players

Revitalizing Conventional Arms Control

Conventional arms control in Europe peaked with the 1990 Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE), which set ceilings on tanks, armored vehicles, artillery, aircraft, and helicopters and required intrusive inspections. An Adapted CFE Treaty was signed in 1999 but never entered into force after NATO states linked ratification to Russian withdrawal from Georgia and Moldova. Russia suspended CFE implementation in 2007 and withdrew entirely in November 2023, prompting NATO Allies to suspend the treaty's operation in response. The Vienna Document, last updated in 2011, remains formally in force but is hampered by Russia's refusal to accept inspections. The core dispute concerns scope and asymmetry: NATO enlargement has changed the geographic distribution of forces since 1990; new categories of weapons — drones, loitering munitions, long-range precision fires — fall outside legacy definitions; and verification regimes designed for static garrison forces struggle with mobile, dispersed deployments observed in Ukraine. Delegates must weigh whether to pursue a comprehensive successor regime, sub-regional arrangements (e.g., in the Baltics or Black Sea), or unilateral and reciprocal transparency measures.

Key players

New Technologies and Emerging Threats to Security

Emerging technologies are eroding the categories on which existing arms control rests. Uncrewed aerial, maritime, and ground systems have proliferated rapidly in Ukraine and the Red Sea; AI-enabled targeting and decision-support tools raise questions about meaningful human control discussed at the CCW Group of Governmental Experts on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems; offensive cyber operations against critical infrastructure are addressed under the UN Open-Ended Working Group on ICTs; and counter-space capabilities — illustrated by ASAT tests and concerns over nuclear weapons in orbit — challenge the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. Hybrid threats, including sabotage of undersea cables, election interference, and the weaponization of migration, blur the line between peacetime and conflict. For the OSCE region, the challenge is whether confidence-building tools developed for tanks and warplanes can be adapted to code, satellites, and algorithms. Delegates will weigh proposals for cyber norms of responsible state behavior, transparency on autonomy in weapons systems, space traffic coordination, and protections for critical undersea and space infrastructure. A cross-cutting question is whether to negotiate binding instruments — risking lowest-common-denominator outcomes — or pursue voluntary norms that can evolve with the technology.

Key players

Resources

News, lessons, and country profiles to prep for Annual Security Review Conference (ASRC) 2026.

Recent reporting to ground your prep

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Lessons

Bite-sized lessons to build the basics

Hidden Stakeholders

Engagement Strategies

Dynamic Analysis

Stakeholder Mapping Workshop

Courses

Guided courses that go deeper on the topic

Advanced Negotiation

Multilateral Negotiation

Policy Brief Writing

Conflict Resolution

Austria June 2026

By committee

Frequently asked questions

Annual Security Review Conference (ASRC) 2026

Jun 17, 2026Vienna, AustriaIn-person

Registration open

Committees & topics

Topics
Regional Security Issues in the OSCE Area · Peace and Security in Europe · A Fair and Lasting Peace in Ukraine · The Future of European Security Architecture · Maintaining Dialogue Channels Amid Confrontation · Reducing Military Risks and Preventing Incidents · Revitalizing Conventional Arms Control · New Technologies and Emerging Threats to Security

Why it matters

How to prepare

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 5 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Austria

As the host nation, AUT emphasizes its role as a neutral facilitator for international dialogue on security matters.

Role in topic

AUT provides the venue and diplomatic framework for the conference, promoting open discussion on global security challenges.

Russia

RUS often highlights the importance of traditional security concepts and the role of major powers in maintaining global stability.

Role in topic

RUS is a significant actor in European and global security, and its perspective on arms control and regional conflicts is central to discussions.

United States

The USA typically advocates for international cooperation, democratic values, and addressing emerging threats like cyber warfare and terrorism.

Role in topic

The USA plays a leading role in global security initiatives and its views on alliances, defense spending, and strategic competition are highly influential.

Germany

DEU emphasizes multilateralism, arms control, and humanitarian aspects of security, often advocating for diplomatic solutions.

Role in topic

DEU is a key economic and political power in Europe, contributing significantly to discussions on regional stability and international security frameworks.

Ukraine

UKR's perspective is heavily shaped by its ongoing conflict, focusing on territorial integrity, sovereignty, and international support.

Role in topic

UKR's experiences are central to discussions on international law, conflict resolution, and the implications of geopolitical aggression.