Monaco makes voluntary contribution
Monaco has made a voluntary contribution of € 25,000 which will be used for training experts in particular from developing countries such as Haiti and francophone African countries. The training will enable these countries to actively participate in the CTBT’s verification regime and to make use of CTBTO monitoring data for disaster warning purposes. Monaco had already made a contribution of €10,000 to that effect in 2011.The Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) regularly receives voluntary contributions aimed at increasing the involvement of developing countries, including by the European Union, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) Fund for International Development (OFID) and individual Member States.
This most welcome contribution reflects Monaco’s commitment to making the world safer from nuclear tests and from tsunamis.
On Friday 16 March 2012, Claude Giordan, the Ambassador of Monaco to the United Nations in Vienna, met with CTBTO Executive Secretary Tibor Tóth, who showed him the International Data Centre (IDC). The IDC collects the up to 10 gigabytes of data collected daily by the CTBTO’s monitoring stations, processes and analyses this data and sends it to Member States for their review and judgment. Giordan also discussed the possibility of Monaco hosting a scientific meeting in the run-up to the next major CTBTO scientific conference in 2013 with Lassina Zerbo, Director of the International Data Centre Division. Monaco signed the CTBT on 1 October 1996 and ratified on 18 December 1998.
Monaco would like to intensify its partnership with the CTBTO. We are interested in exploring and contributing to the CTBTO’s potential for tsunami early warning, in particular in the Mediterranean.