Asia & the Pacific

"Nuclear South Asia: An Analyst's Guide to India, Pakistan, and the Bomb" is a free, open online course from the Stimson Center that addresses nuclear themes and challenges in South Asia. It is meant to provide strategic analysts in India and Pakistan—and the interested public in all countries—a platform to study these issues and engage in a serious, informed conversation. MTA Associate Jayita Sarkar delivered Section 2's Lecture 3.

Two analysts from the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard Kennedy School, Matthew Bunn, co-principal investigator of the Project on Managing the Atom, and Gary Samore, the center’s executive director for research, spoke with the Harvard Gazette about North Korea’s nuclear program and what the latest test means for relations between the government of leader Kim Jong-un and other nations, and how the blast may affect global efforts to limit nuclear weapons.

The Project on Managing the Atom offers fellowships for pre-doctoral, post-doctoral, and mid-career researchers for one year, with a possibility for renewal, in the stimulating environment of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School. The online application for 2016-2017 fellowships opened December 15, 2015, and the application deadline is January 15, 2016. Recommendation letters are due by February 1, 2016.

On April 28, the Project on Managing the Atom joined the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, The Netherlands government, and the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA) in convening nuclear nonproliferation experts from around the world at the United Nations to participate in a Symposium on the 2015 Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference.

After Professor Nikos Passas (Northeastern University) led an MTA Seminar on February 25, titled "Illicit Flows: What They Hide and How to Counter Them", MTA Associate Aaron Arnold interviewed Pasass on Iran's Verification Regime.

The ninth Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) will be held at the UN Headquarters in New York from April 27-May 22, 2015. This is the fourth such conference since the indefinite extension of the NPT in 1995. Participating governments will discuss nuclear disarmament, non-proliferation, and the peaceful use of nuclear energy with a view to arriving at consensus on a number of issues.

Amidst intense negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 countries in Vienna on Iran's nuclear program, Professor Matthew Bunn was interviewed for a July 14 article in the Tehran Times about what a comprehensive agreement would look like and how the two sides of the dispute should approach the talks to obtain significant and substantive results.

What can the United States do to thwart the nuclear ambitions of its allies? Dr. Kogan analyzes past cases where the United States was able to leverage its alliance commitments to stop friendly states from going nuclear. He then asks what lessons these past nuclear negotiations hold for today.  In the coming decade, key U.S. allies in the Middle East (Saudi Arabia) and East Asia (South Korea, Japan) may consider reducing their reliance on U.S. security guarantees by acquiring independent nuclear deterrents.  In conversation with Project Director Kevin Ryan, Dr. Kogan discusses Washington's options in confronting these contemporary allies with nascent nuclear appetites.