PREPARATORY COMMITTEE FOR CONFERENCE ON ILLICIT SMALL ARMS TRADE

TO HOLD THIRD SESSION AT HEADQUARTERS 19 – 30 MARCH

The third and final session of the Preparatory Committee for the United Nations Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects will meet from 19 to 30 March at United Nations Headquarters in New York.  Delegates are expected to finalize proposals to combat the problem, which the Secretary-General has called "one of the gravest threats to international peace and security in the new millennium". 

The Conference, to be held in New York from 9 to 20 July, will address the pressing need to end the human suffering caused by the proliferation of small weapons, while, at the same time, preserving the sovereign right of States to safeguard their national security.

The July Conference will be the first major international meeting on the issue.  The General Assembly's decision to convene it followed intense debate on the subject during the fifty-fourth session of its First Committee on Disarmament and International Security.  At the same session, the Preparatory Committee was established to recommend draft final documents for the Conference, possibly including a programme of action, a political declaration, rules of procedure and modalities for the attendance of civil society groups.  Earlier preparatory sessions were held from 28 February to 3 March 2000, and 8 to 19 January 2001.

The Committee will have before it a revised version of the Chairman's working paper of the draft programme of action to prevent, combat and eradicate the illicit trade in small arms and light weapons. (document A/CONF.192/PC/L.4/Rev.1).  By the preamble of that text, the States participating in the Conference would resolve to coordinate efforts towards eradicating such trade by developing norms at the global, regional and national levels.  They would also support the development of international measures to reduce excessive accumulations and transfers of small weapons throughout the world. 

In those efforts, Conference participants would resolve to place particular emphasis on the regions of the world where conflicts have recently ended and arms issues need to be dealt with urgently.  They would also resolve to mobilize political will throughout the international community and promote the responsibility of States in remedying the problem.

The draft programme of action would propose specific mechanisms for accomplishing the agreed-upon objectives at the regional, national and local levels.  Those mechanisms would include coordination bodies, identification systems, tracking procedures, survey methods, legal remedies and destruction

policies concerning the weapons.  Plans for implementation of those mechanisms would include international cooperation and assistance.  Finally, the draft programme of action would recommend follow-up steps, including a progress review of the Conference no later than 2006 and biannual meetings of States to consider the national and regional implementation of the programme.

Small arms are defined, by the United Nations Department of Disarmament Affairs, as weapons designed for personal use.  Light weapons are those operated by a small crew.  The small arms category includes assault rifles and sub-machineguns; examples of light weapons are portable types of heavy machineguns, grenade launchers, anti-aircraft and anti-tank guns, and anti-aircraft missile launchers.

These arms, according to the Department of Disarmament Affairs, are the “weapons of choice” in internal conflicts, terrorism, and crime –- cheap, portable and lethal.  They are so easy to operate that children can, and do, carry them into combat.  They are responsible for the destabilization of countries and the widespread death and displacement of civilians, disproportionately women and children.  They are notoriously difficult to control since they are often start out legal, are part of the web of lucrative contraband goods that include drugs and gems, and are durable enough to outlast a peace and to flow from conflict to conflict.

The objectives of the July Conference were assembled for discussion by the Conference Chairman, Carlos Dos Santos (Mozambique), in response to a request by participants of the First Preparatory Committee session.  At the second session the Committee debated, in detail, the draft programme of action that evolved from the Chairman's working paper.  There was some concern that many of the ideas expressed were too wide in scope to be implemented realistically.  On the other hand, the need to reach for the widest possible points of consensus to combat the problem was expressed by some delegations.  Specific measures within a global action plan, including technical and financial assistance, were emphasized by other delegations.  How much pressure to exert on States through follow-up mechanisms was also discussed.

At various points during the second session, many delegations highlighted the necessity of establishing adequate procedures for marking and tracking illegal small arms, proposing that a comprehensive mechanism for that purpose could make international arms embargoes practicable.  Some delegations also suggested that the Committee should consider fashioning a legally binding instrument on the issue, while others went farther, calling for an international convention.  Also during the second session, the Committee adopted a draft provisional agenda for the Conference, which included a general exchange of views and the adoption of documents.  The Committee also approved draft rule of procedure 33, by which every effort to reach consensus would be exhausted before matters of substance were put to a vote. 

The third session is expected to complete the work on the agenda and the programme of action, and finalize the rules of procedure.  Outstanding issues include whether there should be a freestanding declaration or if the common goals

and their rationale could be adequately expressed in the preamble to the programme of action. 

Also pending for the third session are decisions on the inclusion of non-governmental organizations at the Conference.  In the first two sessions, some delegations had expressed concern that the participation of non-governmental organizations -- many of which approach the small arms debate from human rights and development perspectives rather than from a purely disarmament perspective -- could over-politicize the debate and risk its success.  Others stressed that civil society organizations were crucial, since civilians had been the main victims of the small-arms scourge.  At the conclusion of the second session, the Committee had agreed on some participation by non-governmental organizations, but did not resolve whether such participation would be limited to those groups deemed "relevant and competent" to the purpose and scope of the Conference.  An informal meeting with non-governmental organization representatives is scheduled.

The issue of small arms and light weapons first appeared on the international political agenda in December 1995.  At that time, the General Assembly requested the Secretary-General, with the assistance of a panel of experts, to report on the nature of illicit small arms accumulation and transfer, and on ways and means to prevent such accumulation and transfer.  In that report, submitted in August 1997 (document A/52/298), the Panel of Governmental Experts on Small Arms found that almost every part of the Organization was dealing with the consequences of recent armed conflicts fought mostly with small arms and light weapons.  Subsequent to a follow-up Assembly resolution in December 1997, a Group of Governmental Experts on Small Arms was established to assist the Secretary-General in preparing a report on the progress made in implementing the

24 recommendations of the Panel and on further actions to be taken (document A/54/258)

The Group of Governmental Experts was also asked to make recommendations on the objective, scope, agenda, dates, venue and preparatory committee of a Conference.  Among its recommendations, the Group proposed that the Conference consider a broad range of measures to reinforce and further coordinate efforts to combat and eradicate the illicit trade.  The Group noted that much of the trade in small arms and light weapons consists of legal transfers to meet the legitimate needs of States for self-defence, to maintain public security within the rule of law and to enable participation in United Nations peacekeeping operations.

Since 1997, a number of global and regional initiatives on the issue have also emerged, such as:  a moratorium on the Importation, Exportation and Manufacture of Small Arms and Light Weapons in West Africa by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS); the July 1998 Inter-American Convention against the Illicit Manufacturing and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives and Other Related Materials; the European Union Joint Action on Small Arms; the July 1999 Decision on the Proliferation, Circulation and Illicit Trafficking of Small Arms and Light Weapons taken by the heads of State and government of the Organization of African Unity (OAU); and the August

1999 decisions of the Council of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) on the Prevention and Combating of Illicit Trafficking in Small Arms and Related Crimes.

Currently, negotiations are under way in Vienna on a legally binding protocol against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Their Parts and Components and Ammunition, to supplement the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime.  Once concluded, the draft protocol will provide an international law enforcement mechanism for crime prevention and the prosecution of traffickers.  The protocol might include articles establishing internationally recognized standards and provisions regarding marking, registration and traceability of firearms.

The officers of the Preparatory Committee are:  Chairman:  Carlos Dos Santos (Mozambique); Vice-Chairmen:  Shen Guofang (China); Makmur Widodo (Indonesia); Hamid Baeidi Nejad (Iran); Mitsuro Donawaki (Japan); Richard Pierce (Jamaica); Nury Vargas (Costa Rica); Yahsar Aliyev (Azerbaijan); Alyaksandr Sychov (Belarus); Valeri Kuchynski (Ukraine); Dace Dobraja (Latvia); Samuel Insanally (Guyana); and Denis Dangue Rewaka (Gabon).

Other Vice-Chairmen include:  Alioune Diagne (Senegal); Ismail Khairat (Egypt); Fares Kuindwa (Kenya); Gunna Lindeman (Norway); Przemyslaw Wyganowski (Poland); Carlos Sorreta (Philippines); Herbert Calhoun (United States); Marie-France Andre (Belgium); Jean Du Preez (South Africa); Robert McDougall (Canada); Henrik Salander (Sweden); Raul Salazar-Cosio (Peru); and Ana Maria Sampaio Fernandes (Brazil).  The Committee Secretary also served as Rapporteur.

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