SMALL ARMS DESTROYED AT PUBLIC CEREMONY IN ALBANIA PART OF UN "WEAPONS FOR DEVELOPMENT" PILOT PROJECT

Press Release
DC/2659/Rev.1*

SMALL ARMS DESTROYED AT PUBLIC CEREMONY IN ALBANIA PART OF UN ‘WEAPONS FOR DEVELOPMENT’ PILOT PROJECT

GRAMSH, Albania, 17 September (Department for Disarmament Affairs) -- The Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs, Jayantha Dhanapala, addressed a public ceremony today in which weapons collected in the Gramsh Pilot Project were symbolically destroyed by mechanical cutting in the main square of the district of Gramsh in central Albania. Mr. Dhanapala noted that “the underlying message of the Gramsh experiment is simple. Give a community a better chance for development and it would be willing to discard weapons. Raise a community’s stakes in peace and it would be more determined to shun violence”.

Following the chaotic events in March 1997, when some 600,000 weapons were removed by civilians from military depots throughout Albania, President Rexhep Meidani, in February 1998, asked the Secretary-General for United Nations assistance in the retrieval of these weapons. An evaluation mission led by Mr. Dhanapala recommended a weapons for development programme beginning with a pilot project in the Gramsh district.

The Gramsh Pilot Project was formally launched in November 1998. Its objective was to assist the Government of Albania in collecting the weapons and ammunition taken, and to create incentives for the civilians to surrender their weapons. The project is overseen by a National Steering Committee, with the participation of the Albanian Ministry of Local Government, a representative of the Gramsh district, the United Nations Department for Disarmament Affairs and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The Committee is chaired by the Minister of Local Government, Arben Demeti.

Its development activities include upgrading the physical infrastructure, such as access roads, the urban lighting system and telecommunications equipment, renovating a post office and constructing a footbridge. The project also features a public-awareness programme, which has generated international interest and financial support. Countries such as Andorra, Belgium, Italy, Japan, Norway, United Kingdom and the European Union have pledged financial assistance.

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* Revised to correct headline.

- 2 - Press Release DC/2659/Rev.1 21 September 1999

At the 17 September public ceremony in Gramsh, the Under- Secretary-General appealed to the international community to consider providing further support for the expansion of the weapons for development model to other parts of Albania. In expressing the view that the spread-effect of the Gramsh Pilot Project extended farther than Albania, he maintained that around the world there were at least 20 other locations where the possibilities of recurring violence could be mitigated by offering the civilian population a combined package of improved citizen security, voluntary weapons surrender and community- based employment-creating and income-generating development incentives, particularly for the youth. Mr. Dhanapala expressed hope that this ceremony in Gramsh would be “an invitation for others to try out what is being accomplished here”.

The ceremony was attended by President Meidani, the local authorities of the district, including the village elders, school children and well over a thousand people. Mr. Dhanapala, who was honoured as a “citizen of Gramsh”, later met Prime Minister Pandeli Majko, who described the Pilot Project as having made disarmament a more than technical matter. “It has reached out to the people”, the Prime Minister noted. Mr. Dhanapala also met Foreign Minister Milo and exchanged views on the importance and impact of public destruction of surrendered weapons, both for its symbolic and practical impact. At a press conference after the ceremony, Mr. Demeti said that the non-use of weapons in the district of Gramsh since the launching of the Pilot Project was of “great significance”.

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