PIR Center continues a section "PIR Test". This project in the form of a game carries equally educational, research and analytical meaning. Users are given the opportunity to take the test - to answer one of the designated questions. Our today's PIR Test is about the Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction.

65 years ago, on October 4, 1957, the first artificial satellite, Sputnik-1, was launched into Earth's orbit under the code name PS-1. This event has a great influence. The launch of the first satellite marked the beginning of space exploration.

The authoritative publishing house Palgrave Macmillan (part of the Springer publishing group) releases the 2nd edition of the monograph Russian–American Nuclear Nonproliferation Dialogue: Lessons Learned and Road Ahead. The book was prepared by a team of 13 young and experienced researchers, edited by PIR Center Founder and Director Vladimir Orlov and PIR Center Research Fellow Sergey Semenov. It is also supplied with prefaces from William Potter, director of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS), and Anatoly Torkunov, Rector of MGIMO of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

PIR Center congratulates its director and founder Dr Vladimir A. Orlov on his birthday. Vladimir Orlov founded PIR Center in 1994, turning it over the years into a leading Russian and international independent research institute in the field of nuclear nonproliferation, disarmament and international security.

PIR Center launches a contest for participation in the final seminar of the educational project Oral History of Nuclear Nonproliferation. The aim of the project is to preserve and transmit the memory of the role of Russian diplomats and the military in shaping the modern architecture of arms control, disarmament and nuclear nonproliferation. This project has no analogues in Russia and is intended to expand the understanding of the younger generation about the processes and events in such a traditionally non-public area as nuclear policy and diplomacy of Russia. The project will allow young international specialists to improve their skills in these issues, as well as share the results of their own research on topical issues of the nuclear nonproliferation regime.

Today, PIR Center celebrates the 95th anniversary of an outstanding Soviet diplomat, scientist, one of the main mentors of the PIR Center for more than 20 years – Amb. Roland Timerbaev. He was one of the world's largest experts in the field of nuclear nonproliferation, a diplomat who made a tremendous contribution to the preparation of the 1968 Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), a key document of the global security system. 

We continue to publish materials on the X NPT Review Conference under the rubric "Notes from the Field: 10th NPT Review Conference through the Eyes of Russian Public Diplomacy". This time, PIR Center Deputy Director Elena Karnaukhova talked to Ambassador Sergio Duarte, the UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs (2007-2012), the Brazilian representative to several International organizations, focusing on disarmament issues, the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the IAEA (1999-2000). He served the Brazilian Foreign Service for 48 years: the Ambassador of Brazil in a number of countries, including Austria, Croatia, Slovakia and Slovenia concurrently (1999-2002), China (1996-1999), Canada (1993-1996), and Nicaragua (1986-1991), Switzerland (1979-1986), the United States (1970-1974), Argentina (1963-1966), and Rome (1961-1963). Sergio Duarte stood at the origins of the NPT and was familiar with Roland Timerbaev.

PIR Center publishes the thesis of H.E. Sergey A. Ryabkov, Deputy Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation, for the International Scientific Conference “On the 60th Anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis”.

"Once we went on a trip with my friend and our families. Rented a rickety old hut in the village, the electricity worked poorly, but there was a lot of firewood. We heated the stove, collected mushrooms, wandered through the swamps, caught crayfish with children in the icy water. There were a lot of impressions, but, unfortunately, the weather had deteriorated. I decided not to stop the trip, to go to the sea. It was difficult to keep the idea a secret and put the children to bed after intense adventures, I had to tell them.

Then, many years later, the children said the words most dear to my wife and me: "Parents, how happy we are that you are so crazy"," - Dmitry Danilov, Head of European Security Department at Institute of Europe, Russian Academy of Sciences.

PIR Center continues to publish materials on the X NPT Review Conference under the rubric "Notes from the Field: 10th NPT Review Conference through the Eyes of Russian Public Diplomacy". PIR Center Deputy Director Elena Karnaukhova talked to Ambassador Hamad Al Kaabi, Permanent Representative of the UAE to the IAEA, about the assessments of the X NPT RevCon, politization of review process, China's positions, Ukraine, the WMD-free zone in the Middle East, JCPOA, UAE in nuclear domain and cooperation with Russia.