UN Office for Disarmament Affairs

The UN Office for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA) is a department of the UN Secretariat that provides substantive and organizational support to disarmament efforts across the UN system. It was established in its current form in 2007, when Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon restructured the former Department for Disarmament Affairs into an Office headed by a High Representative reporting directly to the Secretary-General. The Office had previously existed under various names since 1982, tracing its origin to the Centre for Disarmament created after the First Special Session of the General Assembly on Disarmament (SSOD-I) in 1978.

UNODA's mandate covers the full range of disarmament issues, including weapons of mass destruction (nuclear, chemical, biological), conventional arms, small arms and light weapons, and emerging issues such as cyber and outer space security. It services the work of the First Committee of the General Assembly, the UN Disarmament Commission, and the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, and maintains regional centres in Lima (UN-LiREC), Lomé (UNREC), and Kathmandu (UNRCPD).

Key functions include:

• Supporting implementation of treaties such as the NPT, CTBT, CWC, BWC, Arms Trade Treaty, and the TPNW.
• Maintaining the UN Register of Conventional Arms and the standardized reporting instrument on military expenditures.
• Running capacity-building programmes, including the UN Programme of Action on small arms (PoA) and the SaferGuard programme on ammunition management.
• Producing publications such as the UN Disarmament Yearbook.

UNODA does not negotiate treaties itself; negotiations occur in member-state forums it services. The High Representative as of recent years has been Izumi Nakamitsu of Japan, appointed in 2017. The Office is headquartered in New York with a substantial branch in Geneva.