The General Council of European Center of Nuclear Research (CERN) in its meeting held on June 19th accepted Pakistan’s application for Associate Membership of CERN. The Centre is one of the world’s leading scientific organizations conducting research on high energy particle physics since 1954. Pakistan is the first Asian country to become an Associate Member of the Organization. The only two other Associate Members of CERN are Turkey and Serbia.
Pakistan had formally applied for Associate Membership in February 2013. In October 2013, the CERN Council had responded favourably to Pakistan’s Associate Membership and as a first step had sent a Task Force of experts to visit Pakistan earlier this year to scrutinize the application in greater detail. The team had favourably supported Pakistan’s credentials for Associate Membership.
Pakistan has a two decade long history of collaboration with CERN that began with the signing of a Cooperation Agreement in 1994. Since then, Pakistan has carried out a number of successful projects for CERN involving a variety of technical disciplines with sophisticated technologies and precision engineering science including the manufacture of various equipment and components of CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and associated experiments. Numerous Pakistani scientists, engineers and technicians have undertaken research opportunities at CERN and are contributing interalia to the repair, maintenance and up-gradation of the LHC.
With the new status of Associate Member of CERN, Pakistan looks forward to benefitting from and contributing more intensively to the increasingly innovative and challenging initiatives in science and technology. Deeper involvement with CERN will bring long term benefits to the people of Pakistan and contribute to the country’s socio-economic development in line with the priorities of the government.
Pakistan’s Associate Membership of CERN is recognition of our scientists working in various sectors related to civilian uses of nuclear technology. It is an acknowledgement that Pakistan is a responsible nuclear State with strong credentials in using civil nuclear technology for peaceful purposes including in the areas of power generation, agriculture and medicine.
