The 65 states in the Conference on Disarmament have failed to agree on how to move ahead with full nuclear arms talks, effectively delaying them until 2010, the conference president said Monday.
"Time is running out for this year's session of the CD," said ambassador Christian Strohal, who also represents Austria.
"The window of opportunity to achieve a consensual approach…. is closing – and in all seriousness it is closing today," he added.
"If we still were to embark on a meaningful implementation of our Programme of Work, we would need to take a decision now," he added.
Pointing out that consensus "still eludes us", he closed the session for the day after none of the 65 members sought to intervene.
The Conference on Disarmament's current and last session of 2009 ends on September 18. It traditionally resumes work in January.
Given the lack of time however, Strohal said it was best to move on to other business the conference needed to attend to over the coming weeks.
The talks include the world's major nuclear powers as well as recent atomic weapons states like India, Pakistan and North Korea and those with a nuclear research capability.
In May, they broke more than a decade of deadlock by agreeing on a work plan for 2009.
That included full "negotiations" on an international ban on the production of new nuclear bomb-making material, and talks on nuclear disarmament, the arms race in outer space, and security assurances for non-nuclear states.
But some diplomats blamed Pakistan for openly stalling the conference on a procedural issue.
Pakistan cited unspecified national security concerns to justify its refusal to accept part of the proposed structure for the talks.
Other member states, including Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States had signalled their broad acceptance of the proposal.
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