With it’s recent decision to honour the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, the Nobel Committee has sent a powerful message of concern that should be attached to nuclear weapons. It comes at a moment when North Korea is actively developing its nuclear programme, the fate of the Iran nuclear deal is in the balance, and the United States and Russia are both seeking to modernise their nuclear forces. ICAN campaigned for the drafting of an entirely new disarmament agreement – the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons – that was opened for signature at the United Nations in July this year. We have created a Library special on nuclear disarmament in order to provide you easy access to our collection.

China claims most of the South China Sea, through which more than $5 trillion of world trade passes every year. Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines and Taiwan have rival claims. In addition to substantial natural resources, the South China Sea is of paramount strategic significance to the Asian security paradigm and to global stability. We have created a Library Special on this topic in order to provide you easy access to our collection: a selective bibliography, newsletters, books, articles and online resources.