The First Part of the Conference of Disarmament, 20 January to 27 March 2009

The session will open under the presidency of Viet Nam. The presidency of the Conference rotates amongst its Member States according to the English alphabetical order; each President holds office for four working weeks. Zimbabwe, Algeria, Argentina, Australia and Austria will also hold the presidency during 2009. The three parts of the 2009 session of the Conference will be held from 19 January to 27 March for the first part; 18 May to 3 July for the second part; and 3 August to 18 September for the third part.

In 2008, the Conference was again not able to reach agreement on a programme of work and so was unable to start work on substantive issues. This year teh Conference would likely further consultation to reach consensus on a programme of work, on the basis of the draft decision CD/1840 submitted by the 2008 Presidents of the Conference on 13 March 2008.

According to draft decision CD/1840 by the 2008 Presidents of the Conference, the Conference would appoint Coordinators to preside over substantive discussions three of four core issues identified by the Conference: nuclear disarmament and the prevention of nuclear war; prevention of an arms race in outer space; and negative security assurances for non-nuclear weapon States. On the fourth item, a Coordinator would be appointed to preside over negotiations, without any preconditions, on a non-discriminatory and multilateral treaty banning the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices, thus "providing all delegations with the opportunity to actively pursue their respective positions and priorities, and to submit proposals on any issue they deem relevant in the course of negotiations".