In this Feb. 26, 2020 file photo, a United Nations Security Council meeting is held ahead of the NPT Review Conference, at the U.N. headquarters in New York. (Mainichi/Toshiyuki Sumi)

       NEW YORK (Kyodo) -- The chairman of a U.N. conference on nuclear nonproliferation has sounded out member states on a plan to hold a gathering next summer following the postponement from the earlier scheduled January amid a surge of COVID-19 cases, diplomatic sources said Thursday.

       The meeting to review the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons slated from Jan. 4 to 28 was put off again after being delayed three times from its original date in the spring of 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

       According to the sources, Gustavo Zlauvinen, who serves as chairman of the upcoming NPT review conference, presented two options for the meeting schedule -- Aug. 1 to 26 and Aug. 8 to Sept. 2 -- during consultations with member states on Thursday.

       Some participants responded negatively, saying the dates are too late, the sources said, adding non-nuclear states want the next review conference to be held as a face-to-face session so that they can have deeper discussions.

       Zlauvinen, a former Argentine foreign minister, is expected to explore the possibility of hosting the gathering at an early date as well.

       Even if the NPT review session is held next summer as proposed, it will mean a more than two-year delay from the regular quinquennial conference cycle, casting a cloud on progress in nuclear disarmament.

       The NPT is the world's most widely ratified nuclear arms control agreement. Its review conferences involving both nuclear and non-nuclear states had been held every five years since 1975, with the last gathering in 2015.

       The NPT requires the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States -- to commit to nuclear disarmament. Three other nuclear-weapon states -- India, Israel and Pakistan -- have not joined the pact.

       North Korea, another nuclear-weapon state, pulled out of the treaty in 2003.

       New York City, where the U.N. headquarters is located, is among the hardest-hit areas in another wave of coronavirus infections in the United States.

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