What are the activities of the NSG?

The NSG holds the following meetings:

  • Plenary
    - The NSG Plenary works on the basis of consensus. Overall responsibility for activities lies with the NSG Participating Governments who meet once a year in a Plenary meeting.
    - The Plenary can decide to set up working groups, with recommendations by the Consultative Group, on matters such as the review of the NSG Guidelines, the Annexes, the procedural arrangements, information sharing and transparency activities.
    - The NSG Plenary can also mandate the Chair to conduct outreach activities with specific countries.

  • Consultative Group (CG)
    The CG is the NSG's standing intersessional working body, tasked to hold consultations on issues associated with the Guidelines on nuclear supply and the technical annexes. The CG takes its decisions by consensus.

  • Information Exchange Meeting (IEM)
    The IEM immediately precedes the NSG Plenary and provides another opportunity for Participating Governments to share information and developments of relevance to the objectives and content of the NSG Guidelines.
  • Working Groups
    (currently none)

  • Recent activities of the NSG
    The NSG held an Extraordinary Plenary Meeting in Vienna in December 2002 and agreed to several comprehensive amendments to strengthen its Guidelines, intended to prevent and counter the threat of diversion of nuclear exports to nuclear terrorism. The Plenary emphasised that effective export controls are an important tool to combat the threat of nuclear terrorism. While discussing the DPRK nuclear programme, the Participating Governments of the NSG called on all states to exercise extreme vigilance that their exports and any goods or nuclear technologies that transit their territorial jurisdiction do not contribute to any aspect of a North Korean nuclear weapons effort.