PRESS CONFERENCE ON SMALL ARMS BY HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH

PRESS CONFERENCE ON SMALL ARMS BY HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH

The current conference on small arms and light weapons would be ineffective if it ignored either the grave humanitarian effects or the uncontrolled legal trade of such weapons, Joost Hiltermann, Executive Director of the Arms Division of Human Rights Watch, told correspondents at a Headquarters press conference this afternoon, as representatives of several non-governmental organizations (NGOs) introduced the concerns of the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA).

“By limiting the conference agenda, and by expressly warning that they will not agree to any sort of binding outcome, governments are engaging in an exercise that will yield at most a handful of technical ‘fixes’.  For us in the human rights community, this would be a bitter disappointment”, Mr. Hiltermann said.

Also participating in the press conference, which was sponsored by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), were Loretta Bondi, of the Fund for Peace, USA; Isaac Lappia, Director of Amnesty International, Sierra Leone; and Rubem Cesar Fernandes, Director of Viva Rio of Brazil.

Ms. Bondi, moderating the discussion, introduced IANSA as a coalition of 320 NGOs, of which 150 were attending the conference.  Their programme of action, she said, called for a comprehensive framework for regulating the arms trade that would take into consideration the existing commitments of States to human rights law.  They also called for conventions on brokering activities and weapons marking, along with practical actions for the reduction of weapons through destruction and safe-guarding. 

In addition, she said, IANSA called for restrictions on civilian possession of small arms and light weapons and the outright banning of the possession by civilians of military-style weapons.  Finally, it urged transparency in the accounting of the arms held and traded, in and between countries.  Some figures, she said, were not just dry accountancy:  during the two-week period of the conference there would be another 15,000 people killed by small arms.

Mr. Lappia, of Amnesty International, Sierra Leone, said he came to give personal testimony of such massive humanitarian effects.  Armed soldiers, attempting to capture him, brutalized many in his neighborhood and burned down his home.  Such suffering was “prolonged and intensified by the virtually unrestricted flow of small arms in my country”, he said, which sometimes occurred with the authorization of States.  Such an inflow of arms allowed both the opposition and the Government to commit violent human rights abuses on a massive scale.

Amnesty International, Mr. Lappia said, was calling for the prohibition of arms exports unless it could be reasonably demonstrated that a shipment would not contribute to human rights abuse.  Given the misery he had witnessed, he found inaction on the issue “disgusting and inexcusable”.  He added that “all governments gathered here for this small arms conference have a moral and legal obligation to ensure that small arms no longer fall into the hands of human rights abusers”.

Such abuse was not confined to countries at war, according to Mr. Fernandes of Viva Rio.  In Brazil the last two decades had seen an epidemic of armed violence:  300,000 had been killed in the last decade.  Groups of young drug dealers could control local areas through arms.  Even though small arms were not the cause of the epidemic, they served as the vehicle for its spread.

Mr. Fernandes said the bulk of illicit arms that had been destroyed in Brazil recently were Brazilian-made.  The next largest group were made in the United States, and many of those came through Paraguay.  In that regard, he said, it was essential to restrict the export to those countries which allowed resale to other nations.  In the last group of destroyed weapons, there were 10 handguns for every rifle or assault weapon.  In that light, efforts on control could not be limited to assault weapons, but must include handguns.

A correspondent asked if arms transfers should be prohibited to non-States actors.  Mr. Fernandes replied that, certainly, military weapons should be sold only to the military.  Mr. Hiltermann said that what counted was whether the weapons were used in the commission of human rights abuses, no matter if the buyers were governments, militias or private citizens.  In that connection,

Ms. Bondi said that factions once viewed favorably did not always remain so.

Several correspondents then asked the panel to react to the opposition of the United States to including, in the conference’s programme of action, many of the items IANSA found crucial.  Ms. Bondi said that the United States was isolating itself from its closest allies in a way that was reminiscent of its position on agreements concerning landmines, the International Criminal Court, child soldiers and global warming.

If, for example, the United States maintained its opposition to sections of the programme of action that concerned control of legal trade -- along with Russia, China and others -- those sections would probably be left out or watered down.  “The bottom line here is, this is a consensus exercise”, said Ms. Bondi.  If a country like the United States mustered enough support for its position, “we might very well see the conference fail altogether”. 

Challenged for their reaction to that possibility, the panelists said they would continue to protest and organize at all levels.  Though the conference was an important opportunity that should not be wasted, Mr. Fernandes said, “I am here for life, not just for a couple of weeks”.

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