Executive Secretary meets former CIA Director Leon Panetta, gives lecture at MIIS

Monterey, California, 19 September 2014


In Monterey, California, the Executive Secretary of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO), Lassina Zerbo, met with Leon Panetta, former Secretary of Defense and former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Panetta is co-founder and chairman of the Monterey-based Panetta Institute for Public Policy.
Zerbo and Panetta, who also served as Chief of Staff to President Clinton, discussed progress made in the full implementation of the CTBT verification regime and ways to advance entry into force of the Treaty.

Zerbo with former Secretary of Defense and CIA Director Leon Panetta

While in Monterey, the Executive Secretary gave a lecture at the Monterey Institute of International Studies and opened the Institute's annual semester-long arms control simulation course.
Zerbo also held consultations with the Director of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS), William Potter and other faculty and senior staff on the CTBT, its verification regime and prospects for entry into force.
In addition, Zerbo met with CNS Visiting Fellows, a group of junior diplomats and academics from a range of States, including from a number of non-signatory and non-ratifying States.

Click for podcast with Executive Secretary Zerbo by Arms Control Wonk Jeffrey Lewis

On 26 September, Zerbo will attend the CTBT Ministerial Meeting in New York. The Executive Secretary is scheduled to meet several foreign ministers, including those from a number of CTBT non-ratifying states.