The 2013 session of the First Committee starts

Today, the UNGA First Committee starts. The First Committee is the General Assembly's consensus-building body for disarmament and international security. 

During the coming four weeks, we will publish our First Committee Monitor each Monday. The FCM will summarize and analyze the discussions of the previous week. We will distribute hard copies of the FCM each Monday at the First Committee, so if you’re in New York make sure to pick up a copy. If you’re not in New York, you can get it directly in your inbox, make sure you subscribe here to not miss a single issue.

You can also read all the statements delivered at the First Committee here, keep track of all resolutions here and check out all documents and reports here. In addition, make sure you keep track of all side events through our “calendar of events”. This year, there’s several interesting events happening, such as “The humanitarian initiative to prohibit nuclear weapons" on 17th October, "Fully autonomous weapons" on 22nd October, or "Operationalising the gender-based violence criterion in the Arms Trade Treaty" on 23rd October. 

If you want an overview of the main topics that are up for discussion at the First Committee, read our First Committee Briefing Book. It’s a collaborative publication together with some of the main civil society campaigns and organisations, like Control Arms, International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, Campaign to Stop Killer Robots, International Campaign to Ban Landmines, Cluster Munition Coalition, International Network on Explosive Weapons, Sou da Paz, and of course WILPF. 

And don’t forget to follow RCW on Twitter and Facebook for live comments and more updates. We really appreciate feedback and comments, so do let us know what you think of our Monitor or the discussions at the First Committee.