The sitting "Organization for Prohibition of Chemical Weapons; Past, Present and Future" was held on January 1st, 2017 and Dr. Shahriar Khateri; OPCW Senior Assistance and Protection Officer, a number of chemical warfare victims, specialists and individuals attended the sitting.

In the beginning, the biography of Professor Fritz Haber; German chemist, scientist and the father of modern chemical weapons, was retold and his scientific discoveries, his role in producing these weapons as well as the history of the use of such armaments were reviewed.

Thereafter, the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) as the most successful international disarmament treaty was studied and its history, structure, annexes and member states including Syria were investigated. It is noteworthy that OPCW was awarded with Noble Peace Prize in 2013 after Syria joined this convention.

In the following, OPCW was introduced as the administrative arm of the convention and its tasks and authorities in the framework of convention, were analyzed. Thereafter, issues such as elimination of existing stockpiles, the destruction methods, inspections, preventive measures and verification system of member states' reports were studied after reviewing the nine major sections of this organization.

Dr. Khateri explained about the technical dimensions of implementation of the convention such as the perpetual observation of the developments in chemistry for adjusting the activities with the goals of the convention and the cooperation of different scientists with the OPCW to attain the goal of a world free of chemical weapons. Establishment of an international group of professional counselors directed by Prof. Mahdi Belali Mood, who assist the OPCW's Director General in the successful implementation of the convention, is of such contributions.

In this session, the potentials and facilities of the OPCW for educating the member states for safety measures in their industrial activities as well as the accident management and assistance were studied.

The other topic to be discussed was the responsibility of Non-governmental actors on the use of chemical weapons. A group has been established to study the challenges and priorities faced by OPCW to find a solution for the above mentioned problem.

In the end, the attendees' questions were answered.