Guterres tells the IAEA that attacks on nuclear sites are rising as the 70th conference opens

The 70th IAEA General Conference opened on Monday at the Vienna International Centre with a message from UN Secretary-General António Guterres that put attacks on nuclear facilities at the front of the week. Monica Juma, who heads the UN office in Vienna, read the text. Guterres said the conference meets in a time of turbulence. Attacks on nuclear sites are rising. The drivers of proliferation are accelerating, he said, while the guardrails against it are falling.

He also pointed to a build-out of nuclear power that he called a revolution in generation, one that needs careful management. More than ever, the message said, the world needs the Agency’s professionalism, impartiality and technical work. Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi delivered his own opening statement the same day. Gustavo Zlauvinen of Argentina is president of this session. Peter Burian handed over the chair.

The conference runs through 18 September. The Agency counts 181 member states. Organisers expect 2,500 to 3,000 participants in a normal year. Xinhua put this week’s attendance closer to 4,000 once international organisations and non-governmental groups are included. National statements in the plenary are capped at seven minutes. The agenda covers the 2025 annual report, the 2027 budget update, safeguards in Ukraine, safeguards in the Middle East, the application of safeguards in North Korea, and a U.S. request to discuss nuclear material transferred under AUKUS.

Tuesday and Wednesday belong to the Scientific Forum, the side event that usually sets the public tone. This year’s title is “Rays of Hope: Delivering on the Promise of Cancer Care.” The programme opened with Grossi and two vice-presidents, Jeremiah Kpan Koung of Liberia and Deogratius John Ndejembi of Tanzania, plus Abdulhamid Alkhalifa of the OPEC Fund. Rays of Hope is the Agency’s four-year-old drive to put radiotherapy and nuclear medicine into countries that lack them. Case studies on the first day came from Malawi, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Liberia.

The contrast inside the building is the point of the week. In one hall, delegates argue about inspectors, damaged plants and who may put nuclear material in a submarine. In the next, ministers talk about linear accelerators and training for technicians. Both files run through the same Agency. Guterres’s warning was aimed at the first hall. The Scientific Forum is the Agency’s answer in the second: a claim that nuclear science still has a civilian use that does not depend on the state of the non-proliferation regime.

Whether that split holds depends on events outside Vienna. The Ukraine safeguards paper is on the agenda because plants in a war zone are no longer a theoretical problem. The Middle East item returns every year. The AUKUS paper is new enough to have its own document number. Guterres did not name those files. He named the trend: more attacks, weaker guardrails, more reactors on the way. The 70th conference is where member states decide how much money and political cover the inspectors get to deal with all three.