Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) is an international institute based in Stockholm. It was founded in 1966 and provides data, analysis and recommendations for armed conflict, military expenditure and arms trade as well as disarmament and arms control. The research is based on open sources and is directed to decision-makers, researchers, media and the interested public. SIPRI's organizational purpose is to conduct scientific research in issues on conflict and cooperation of importance for international peace and security, with the goal of contributing to an understanding for the conditions for a peaceful solution of international conflicts and sustainable peace. SIPRI was ranked among the top three non-US world-wide think tanks in 2014 by the University of Pennsylvania Lauder Institute's Global Go To Think Tanks Report. In 2020, SIPRI ranked 34th amongst think tanks globally. History In 1964, Prime Minister of Sweden Tage Erlander put forward the idea of establishing a peace research institute to commemorate Sweden's 150 years of unbroken peace. A Swedish Royal Commission chaired by Ambassador Alva Myrdal proposed in its 1966 report to establish an institute, later named the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, SIPRI. The institute's research should seek to contribute to "the understanding of the preconditions for a stable peace and for peaceful solutions of international conflicts" and the Commission recommended that research be concentrated on armaments, their limitation and reduction, and arms control. The commission also recommended that SIPRI work is of "an applied research character directed towards practical-political questions [which] should be carried on in a constant interchange with research of a more theoretical kind". SIPRI has built its reputation and standing on competence, professional skills, and the collection of hard data and precise facts, rendering accessible impartial information on weapon developments, arms transfers and production, military expenditure, as well as on arms limitations, reductions and disarmament. The task of the institute is to conduct "scientific research on questions of conflict and cooperation of importance for international peace and security with the aim of contributing to an understanding of the conditions for peaceful solution of international conflicts and for a stable peace". The Swedish Riksdag decided that the Institute be established on 1 July 1966 with the legal status of an independent foundation. Organisation SIPRI's organisation consists of a governing board, director, deputy director, research staff collegium and support staff. The governing board takes decisions on important matters concerning the research agenda, activities,