General Assembly

Wrapping up its week-long session today, the Preparatory Committee unanimously adopted its draft report, as orally revised, for submission to the Second Review Conference on the Programme of Action on Small Arms and Light Weapons.

The Human Rights Committee continued discussion of its working methods today, adopting a paper on its relationship with non-governmental organizations. Prior to the adoption, the Committee carried out a paragraph-by-paragraph review of the document, which had been drafted by Cornelius Flinterman, expert from the Netherlands, and Iulia Antoanella Motoc, expert from Romania.

The Human Rights Committee met today to consider its working methods, including proposals to name a case manager, add a second working group on communications, and draw up a master calendar.

On the penultimate day of its week-long session, members of the Preparatory Committee fine-tuned a draft report to be sent to the Second Review Conference on the Programme of Action on Small Arms and Light Weapons, to be held in New York from 27 August to 7 September 2012. Members held formal and informal discussions throughout the day to finalize the draft report of the Preparatory Committee.

Ending human suffering was the primary purpose of the United Nations Programme of Action on Small Arms and Light Weapons, a Nigerian doctor reminded delegates today as they prepared for an upcoming review conference. “I am here as a medical doctor,” said Hakeem Ayinde of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War — International Action Network on Small Arms. “Why are you here?

“Cape Verde was one of the rare African countries to have achieved all the Millennium Development Goals,” Antonio Pedro Monteiro Lima, Permanent Representative of Cape Verde, emphasized today, as he updated the Human Rights Committee on the situation in the country, in the absence of a State report.

Although national and regional efforts were being made to combat the illicit arms trade, more international assistance and cooperation was essential for the effective implementation of the relevant Programme of Action, delegations said today as they continued their thematic debate on all aspects of trafficking in small arms and light weapons.

As it concluded discussion on Guatemala’s third periodic report today, the Human Rights Committee commended the country for putting in place legislative measures to improve its compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, but added it had not done enough to protect human rights defenders, address the consequences from its 36-year internal armed conflict and protect indigenous rights.

Fifteen years had passed since peace accords had been signed in Guatemala to bring to an end a 36-year-long internal armed conflict that left behind serious socio-economic consequences and human rights violations, Gert Rosenthal, Permanent Representative of Guatemala to the United Nations, told the Human Rights Committee today, as he presented the country’s third periodic report.

The tragic deaths of thousands of men, women and children worldwide, killed every day by illegal firearms, was the high price of failing to halt the spread of those weapons, delegations at United Nations Headquarters said today as they began preparations for an upcoming conference to review the Programme of Action on Small Arms and Light Weapons.