Egyptian Resolution Wins Overwhelming Majority: International Move to Ensure Oversight of Nuclear Facilities in the Middle East

The 70th session of the General Conference of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) adopted, by an overwhelming majority, the annual resolution presented by Egypt on the application of IAEA safeguards to all nuclear facilities in the Middle East. The resolution was supported by 112 countries, with no country voting against it, according to the Office of the Spokesperson for the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Office of the Spokesperson stated that this step reflects the weight Egypt enjoys within international organizations, as well as the consistency of Egypt’s position with the objective of strengthening security and stability in the region, through calling for the application of the IAEA safeguards system to all Middle Eastern countries and all their nuclear facilities without exception, working toward establishing a zone free of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East, and promoting the universalization of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

Egypt stressed the central role of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in the system for maintaining and strengthening international peace and security since its conclusion in 1968 to the present day. It reaffirmed the need for the international community to fulfill its responsibilities and fully comply with the implementation of all legal obligations arising from the treaty, while intensifying international efforts to break the deadlock affecting the process of establishing a zone free of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East.

In this context, Egypt noted that the convening of the seventh session of the United Nations Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction, scheduled to take place in November 2026 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, represents an opportunity for all states in the region to engage in serious and constructive dialogue and to join the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, thereby supporting efforts to achieve the universalization of the treaty and establish a zone free of weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East.