WORKSHOP ON WEAPONS COLLECTION AND INTEGRATION OF FORMER COMBATANTS INTO CIVIL SOCIETY CONCLUDES IN GUATEMALA CITY
Press Release
DC/2619
WORKSHOP ON WEAPONS COLLECTION AND INTEGRATION OF FORMER COMBATANTS INTO CIVIL SOCIETY CONCLUDES IN GUATEMALA CITY
19981123 Experiences of Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Colombia Discussed During Three-day EventNEW YORK, 23 November (Department for Disarmament Affairs) -- From 18 to 20 November, participants from 20 countries and 10 United Nations agencies, regional organizations and citizen groups met in Guatemala City for a workshop to exchange experiences in weapons collection and integration of former combatants into civil society, the first of its kind.
The workshop was organized by the Department for Disarmament Affairs of the United Nations in cooperation with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Guatemala. The workshop was opened by Foreign Minister Eduardo Stein and closed by Vice-Foreign Minister Gabriel Aguilera Peralta of Guatemala. Under- Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs Jayantha Dhanapala's statement to the workshop was delivered by Evgeniy Gorkovskiy, Director and Deputy to the Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs.
The discussions at the workshop were led by government officials, former guerrillas and representatives of civil society from Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua.
Drawing attention to an estimated one million weapons in circulation among civilians, Nobel Laureate Rigoberta Menchu of Guatemala said that the successful demobilization of former combatants must be followed by the "de- weaponization" of civil society including the former military.
Ramón Custodio López from Honduras said that his country had become an "eye of the hurricane" throughout the 1980s as it suffered from the spillover of armed conflicts in Central America. Over 50,000 weapons were reported to be circulating among its population, and retrieving them should be conceived as exercises in investment in citizen security and community development, rather than programmes for buy-back.
Navarro Wolff, a former chief of the M-19 guerrilla group in Colombia, proposed the establishment of rural guards to encourage voluntary weapons surrender by people living in remote parts of the country and saw former
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guerrillas as having the experience to provide that kind of service in cooperation with the national police and civil authorities.
Retired Colonel José Antonio Almendariz from El Salvador sought opportunities for gainful employment for former military officials as an incentive for voluntary weapons surrender. El Salvador is a country where more deaths are reported to have occurred after the end of armed conflict than during it.
Silvio Diaz, Director of the Commission on Implementation of Peace Accords in Nicaragua, highlighted the difference in the outcome of demobilization and weapons collection programmes in various countries in the region. Violeta Granera, Executive Director of the Foundation for Democracy, attributed the experience of Nicaragua partly to the exclusive concentration of the effort on former combatants while ignoring the concerns of a large number of people from the farming sector, some of whom were forced to arm themselves in self-defence.
The holding of the workshop was made possible by voluntary contributions from the Governments of Germany, Italy and Norway, who are members of an open- ended group of countries interested in providing financial and political support for practical disarmament measures such as weapons collection, demobilization and integration of former combatants into civil society. The proposal to hold the workshop originated with the Permanent Mission of Guatemala to the United Nations and received organizational and substantive support from the Department for Disarmament Affairs, which has been designated by the Secretary-General as the focal point for all activities on small arms within the United Nations system.
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