In Tuesday’s secret vote, Slovakia secured one of the three seats in the Executive Council of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) reserved for the Eastern European region for the years 2026-2028.
In Tuesday’s secret vote, Slovakia secured one of the three seats in the Executive Council of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) reserved for the region of Eastern Europe for the years 2026-2028. State Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic Marek Eštok said on the X platform here, reports TASR.
- Slovakia was elected to the OPCW Executive Board for the years 2026–2028.
- It received 107 votes and will represent Eastern Europe.
- The OPCW Executive Board monitors compliance with the Chemical Weapons Convention.
- The new members were elected at the 30th OPCW Conference of States.
Russia was also a candidate for the region of Eastern Europe
“We thank everyone who supported our candidacy. Slovakia will be a committed and responsible member (of the council),” wrote Eštok.
Slovakia received 107 votes. Other members of the OPCW Executive Council for Eastern Europe became Slovenia and Ukraine, while Slovenia received the highest number of 122 votes among the five candidates, the STA agency reported.
Russia also ran for the region of Eastern Europe, but according to the TASS agency, it received only 51 votes. Russia lost its seat on the OPCW Executive Board in 2023, receiving 65 votes, just short of the required minimum of 66 votes.
Thirtieth Conference
The OPCW Executive Board, which monitors, among other things, the implementation and compliance with the Chemical Weapons Convention, has 41 seats. Its members are elected by the Conference of Contracting States for a two-year term of office on a rotating basis by region.
The thirtieth such conference is taking place in The Hague from November 24 to 28, and the participants on Tuesday elected new members of the executive board for the years 2026-2028. For the African region, they are Algeria, Ghana, Nigeria and the Republic of South Africa, for Asia Iran, Indonesia, Pakistan and Qatar, for Latin America and the Caribbean (GRULAC group) Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador and Guatemala, and for the group Western European and other countries (WEOG) Australia, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.
