NationStates Jolt Archive

http://www.nationstates.net/images/flags/uploads/galdago__0.jpg The Commonwealth of Galdago

Esteemed delegates,

The following proposal has been laid before the World Assembly as a statement of resolve against the dangers posed by the illegal sale and transfer of man portable armaments and a plan of action for voluntary and systemic measures to fight the black market movement of these small arms and light weapons.



Category: International Security
Strength: Mild

THE WORLD ASSEMBLY,

CONSIDERING that the illicit traffic in small arms impedes development, constitutes a threat to populations and security, and contributes to the destabilization of States;

RECOGNIZING the suffering caused by illicit trafficking in small arms and that States bear the obligation to bolster their efforts in developing practical ways of addressing the problem;

REAFFIRMING the right to individual or collective self-defense recognized within World Assembly implying that States have the right to acquire arms for defense;

REITERATING the importance of the right of self-determination of all peoples, especially under alien domination or foreign occupation;

CONVINCED of the need for a thorough approach to control and reduce small arms and light weapons in a balanced manner to ensure international peace and security;

AFFIRMING past efforts of international cooperation in reducing the illicit sale and traffic of small arms;

ADOPTS the following recommendations for the curbing of illicit traffic in small arms and light weapons with respect to the definitions of this weaponry articulated in the annex of this resolution;


REQUESTS an independent council be formed to continue to consider the matter and report to it at its subsequent sessions on the implementation of this resolution and to seek and consider the views of all Member States on the objective, scope, agenda, dates and venue of an international conference on the illicit arms trade;


DECIDES to convene an international conference on all aspects of the illicit arms trade no later than 2009;


ENCOURAGES the establishment of national programmes to combat the illicit transfer of small arms and ensure the collection thereof within the suggested parameters of paragraph 5 and invites the international community to render technical and financial support to strengthen the ability of States to take these actions;


RECOMMENDS that participating States should implement programmes of action which would:


employ regulations to control the production of small arms and light weapons within their jurisdiction, and over the export, import, transit or retransfer of such weapons;


generate agencies responsible for policy guidance of efforts to prevent illicit trade, including aspects of illicit manufacture, control, trafficking, circulation, brokering, trade, as well as tracing, finance, collection and destruction of small arms;


ensure responsibility for all small arms held and issued by the state and create measures for tracing such weapons;


and enact, where possible, effective disarmament, demobilization and reintegration programmes, including effective collection, control, storage and destruction of small arms, particularly in post-conflict zones, as well as address the special needs of children affected by armed conflict.


ANNEX

DEFINITIONS
In the present resolution and its aspects:

"Small arms" means man-portable firearms and their ammunition primarily designed for individual use by military forces as lethal weapons; the term shall be used interchangeably to also denote the aggregate of small arms and light weapons;


"Light weapons" means some man-portable firearms and their ammunition, light artillery guns and rockets, and guided missiles for use against armored vehicles, aircraft, or fortifications.

This proposal is clear in its intent. The resolution would:

affirm the right of states to take up arms in defense of sovereignty and collective protection,
recognize the right of self-determination for all peoples, especially those suffering from political oppression and foreign occupation,
solely aim to unite the nations of the World Assembly against the illegal traffic of weaponry which could threaten the security of states and their populations.
seek to address the inherent dangers created in post-conflict zones by uncollected weaponry, especially those posed to children and families affected by armed conflict and the illegal sale of these weapons to destabilizing forces.

Estimates of Galdagan foreign policy and national security analysts indicate that there are enough uncontrolled small arms in circulation around the world today to arm every one in ten to one in fifteen people. Small arms and light weaponry have consistently been the tools of choice in major conflicts of the past decade. They have accounted for millions of deaths, 90% of which were civilian casualties—80% of the total consisting of women and children—all of whom are often deliberate targets of violence. As the black market trade in these weapons grow, so does the obstacle it creates in providing humanitarian aid in conflict zones, especially in areas where insurgents, armed with this weaponry, consistently stifle government efforts at civilian relief.

Some 40-50% of the world's traffic in small arms and light weaponry may be illegal, and even some legal exports can still find their way into the black market. Often times this can be a result of weapons caches left uncollected in post-conflict zones that are obtained by traffickers who provide them for illicit trade. Such easy access to man-portable weaponry only serves to encourage violence and exacerbate endemic tension. This can lead to a self-perpetuating cycle where the rise of violence will only increase the demand for small arms acquisition. Moreover, there are increasing indications of links between traffic in small arms and the illegal drug trade. No nation is immune to the effects the proliferation of these weapons to undesirable partisans worldwide.

It is for this reason that we cannot afford to ignore this threat to international stability and the grotesque humanitarian crisis it has created. This proposal is offered as a testament that World Assembly members recognize the threat of the black market arms trade and are willing to stand together in a spirit of cooperative assistance with each other to combat the spread of small arms and light weaponry to guerrillas and smugglers worldwide. It offers a broad set of guidelines for a voluntary course of action for participant states to assist in meaningful ways with monitoring and averting the illicit transfer of devastating weapons.

For this reason, the Galdagan Mission to the World Assembly urges delegates of this august body to thoughtfully consider this proposal and add their endorsement.

Regards,
Isaac Saerens
Consul to the World Assembly
Commonwealth of Galdago (http://www.nationstates.net/galdago )

http://www.louisiana.edu/~lst4606/ns/Galdago/smallseal.gif

OOC: For those of you that might be interested in the real-world dilemma that's sparked this fictional resolution, you can see more about what the actual UN has been doing to combat illicit arms traffic since 2001 at their Issue Page for Small Arms and Light Weapons (http://disarmament.un.org/cab/salw.html).

It's pretty hard to take this seriously. You present a proposal full of empty phrases and the most overly cautious language imaginable, with all the legislative weight of a politely worded Post-It. You then deliver an atomic bloviation warning of the gravity of the situation. The two don't really tally up. Either this is a critical issue requiring some action, or it's a piffling concern that a council, a conference, and a few vague urgings will easily clear up. It is possible to retain all the respect for national sovereignty, the right to collective self-defence, and whatever disclaimers have to be thrown as bones to the forces of reaction, while still making some legislative requirements, the most obvious of which would be the introduction of some form of arms export code, holding manufacturers and brokers responsible for arms transactions. It would also be possible, given the "Prevention of Terrorism" resolution did nothing to address this, to criminalise the financing of illicit arms transfers and to require the freezing of funds designated for such purposes.

Now, we're well aware Galdagan legislators in the early UN were well regarded, so we would hope you haven't mounted a telegram campaign to propel this whale carcass to quorum yet? Because even if you aren't willing to amend the substantive core of the proposal, it could still be usefully tinkered with. For example:

- Two elements of your preamble make no sense. The WA has never affirmed a right to national self-determination, meaning your proposal cannot 'reiterate' it: it has to establish it anew. (And given that would be a fairly colossal individual policy, it might be best to simply skip the issue entirely.) And there have been no attempts to cooperate on reducing illegal arms transfers in the WA, unless you're referencing the rather limp Clause 3 of the "Nuclear Arms Possession Act". Efforts at such under the UN - which again, barely extended beyond this resolution's original incarnation - are irrelevant. So the reference should probably be omitted.

- Your Clause 1 cites a recommendation with no obvious provenance.

- Re: Clause 2, the WAGA does not have 'sessions': it sits in a continuous legislative state.

- The conference UN Resolution #57 called for was never convened. Just something to bear in mind in calling for a new one.

- In 5 b), 'maintain' or some other term would be preferable to 'generate', because some nations will already have 'generate[d]' such agencies in the past.

- In your annex, the term 'person-portable' is our preferred term, as many modern militaries contain soldiers of both sexes. We'll note also that, given we briefly considered legislation on MANPADS, we both have used the term 'man-portable' ourselves, and are very pleased that such systems would be included in this proposal.

-- Samantha Benson
etc., etc.
Quintessence of Dust, Delegate of Wysteria

The Galdagan Consulate wishes only to note that it does not favor the role of the World Assembly as an international governing body and as such, despite relinquishing a certain level of national sovereignty to the assembly in order to obtain membership, will unequivocally never author and occasionally not sponsor language in resolutions and measures that can be taken to be encoded law. Details of a nation's measures to meet the specifications of the programme of action are left to each sovereignty on its own terms. If this matter is not seen as one of international urgency that the body feels it will willingly cooperate with, the Commonwealth has no desire to be the spark that kindles the flames of a heavy handed and wide-sweeping authoritarian agency piloted by the WA that can command every aspect of the production, acquisition, and transfer of arms by its "constituents."

We might also note that the Wysterian delegation's petulance regarding semantics is at best a blustering rebuke. While the General Assembly may be seen to sit in a continuous legislative state, it might be noted that Consul Saerens takes time to sleep from day to day, as do many of the other delegates to the body. Perhaps the delegate might consider such rest between sessions so as to take the didactic edge off the proposal's scrutiny.

Yes, because I clearly said that the WA should 'command every aspect' of the arms trade.

Oh, wait...

The UN evolved quite a lot in the years following your proposal's passage. The WA has continued that. Modern resolutions full of whispery verbiage and nothing else are, rightly, seen as fairly irrelevant. And I'm speaking as the author of several such proposals! It's also a little strange not to favour the role of the WA as an international governing body, given the first sentence on the WA information page: 'The WA is the world's governing body.'

Your ACA associate Dashanzi was for many months contemplating a resolution to impose an 'Arms Export Code of Conduct'. Arms enter the black market because of improper regulation of arms transfers: brokers are not held to industry standards, militaries with histories of corruption are freely supplied, and arms trades are cloaked in a secrecy that would not be acceptable in other areas of trade. There is no obvious reason for this to continue, and a requirement for an arms trade licensing standard would greatly ameliorate the problem: indeed, as your own distended rhetoric makes clear, such would actually improve, rather than retrograde, international security.

If you are not willing to sponsor legislation to adequately address the issue, the proposal rules on duplication/contradiction make it positively irresponsible to sponsor legislation to inadequately address the issue.

And, as I have said, all of that notwithstanding, there are still changes that could be made to the proposal while leaving it in the same essential condition, such as eliminating the irrelevant references. I will also ask again how effective you think calling for a conference will really be, given the conference called for by UNR#57 was never convened.

-- Sam Benson
etc.

The political upheavals of 2004 and 2005 that left the UNCIAT toothless and the dissolution of the Miervatian Small Arms Control Conference were beyond the scope of anything the Commonwealth might have predicted at the time of the original measure's conception. With the relative dissipation of the international tensions of that time, the Consulate has chosen this time to reintroduce the measure to a new body with the same purpose to develop the guidelines for which the original UNCIAT was responsible and never issued. The recommendations of the council are those that will be adopted by member states pursuant to the mandates of Article 1 and much can be done to assist their development by holding a conference to speak about the particulars of arms transport and sale in order to identify problems and propose solutions. If Representative Benson and the Quintessence of Dust are not in agreement on any particular note that leads them to deny this claim then such is their wont and right. Our pleas for the currently suggested course of action will continue unabated and unaltered.

While Quintessence of Dust may have the only responses thus far, there are others who will doubtless agree with the Ambassador. The World Assembly is not the UN, and adaptation to modern requirements will go a long way towards gaining the support you need for passage.

As the author of one of the few resolutions to make the successful transition from UN to WA, I encourage you to consider the counters to your proposal. Blithely brushing them aside with snide ad hominems won't endear your argument (or you) to the current membership. I gained insight during the original debate 4 years ago, and more during the drafting phases of the current Rights and Duties resolution. I consider the current version to be an amalgamation of the best ideas of the WA regulars, which add nicely to the best ideas of the then UN regulars. It was a collaborative effort.

You can consider accommodation and win not only their votes, but their support.

Or you can grandstand from your lofty perch and push the damn thing through entirely on your own.

I give the former better odds.

MJ Donovan, CEO Emeritus
WA Ambassador, Frisbeeteria

CONVINCED of the need for a thorough approach to control and reduce small arms and light weapons in a balanced manner to ensure international peace and security;We would be more concerned with the illegal uncontroled trade of larger heavier weapons than one might include here. As one may have a basic need for these yet no need for a tank in place of a fishing boat next to the car in their garage; and unless they are hunting some large fish not have a destroyer or battleship to fish from.

ADOPTS[/QUOTEWe want a nice pet so can we adopt a tiger and use it in place of a gun to protect our property.
[QUOTE]REQUESTSSuper at seven but we get it when the wives are ready to serve us.
DECIDESTo do what the wives have me scheduled to do as I have to live with all five of them.
ENCOURAGESYou to find some words that have more teeth than these.
RECOMMENDSMy great uncle recommended that I never marry but I didn't listen to him.

CvRtshoe ReeSabniuak,
Minister of Apportions

That's taking a rather insular view of international relations. We weren't active on the international stage when the UNCIAT disintegrated, but archives indicate such nations as Knootoss and SeOCC played a role. Clearly, tensions between nations that have largely retreated from the international stage are no longer an issue. But what of new tensions? For example, our nation left the International Democratic Union on unfavourable terms, and I imagine there are members of that region who would balk at any potential membership of us on a new WACIAT. There are newer capitalist and newer anticapitalist nations and regions that are active, and exist on terms of mutual disdain, meaning there would no doubt be disputes over WACIAT membership. If anything, the proliferation of interest groups and think-tanks within the late UN and now the WA is more likely to exacerbate tensions.

Furthermore, you do not need a resolution to authorise a conference. We have participated in conferences in the past, and have been considering calling one on international health topics (particularly infectious disease). No such conferences have been officially called for by the WA, though. If the conference is such a good idea - and I'll note I haven't suggested it wouldn't produce good ideas - why not hold it now (or at some convenient point) and then write a resolution based on its recommendations?

Once your resolution passes, it will no longer be our 'wont and right' to disagree, because rules on duplication/contradiction will probably prevent any real legislation passing. New anti-terrorism legislation cannot be authored until "Prevention of Terrorism" is repealed, even though it contains even less substantive language than this proposal. So our interest is not just in the present, but in the future, and we would not be surprised were not in fact this proposal an effort to bolster the illicit arms trade by hamstringing the WA from really addressing it.

Finally, your statement that your course of action will continue 'unabated and unaltered' is a little disturbing. Are you not willing to consider any changes to your own proposal, even the stylistic and non-content-changing ones we included in the latter half of our initial response? Or is this proposal, in fact, perfect?

-- Sam Benson
etc.

Edit: Since this has already assumed such a confrontational character, I should perhaps make it clear I fully favour the restitution of this resolution. It just seems silly to do so without availing yourself of the opportunity to improve it.

So we've got a choice of a toothless wonder that treads awfully close to straying into Gun Control and manages to undermine itself in its own justifications, or nothing? I'll take the nothing, it's less futile.

REAFFIRMING the right to individual or collective self-defense recognized within World Assembly implying that States have the right to acquire arms for defense;

...implying that the arms trade is a good thing. We'll reserve judgement on that, because...

REITERATING the importance of the right of self-determination of all peoples, especially under alien domination or foreign occupation;

...not only is this not a right the WA has declared, it rather strongly implies that the illegal arms trade (the one that goes to the subversives under alien domination or foreign occupation) is a good thing. A bit of an own goal, wouldn't you say?

Then we get to that great exercise in pointlessness, the recommendations:

employ regulations to control the production of small arms and light weapons within their jurisdiction, and over the export, import, transit or retransfer of such weapons;
What do you mean by "retransfer"? It makes me worry that this affects the domestic arms trade, and pushes uncomfortably towards the Gun Control category.

generate agencies responsible for policy guidance of efforts to prevent illicit trade, including aspects of illicit manufacture, control, trafficking, circulation, brokering, trade, as well as tracing, finance, collection and destruction of small arms;
Again, the sweeping nature of this makes me worried about category drift. And while "generating agencies responsible for policy guidance" warms the cockles of my bureaucratic little heart, it's going to put a good few people off for sure.

ensure responsibility for all small arms held and issued by the state and create measures for tracing such weapons;
No arguments here, except for it not being mandatory, obviously.

and enact, where possible, effective disarmament, demobilization and reintegration programmes, including effective collection, control, storage and destruction of small arms, particularly in post-conflict zones, as well as address the special needs of children affected by armed conflict.
This the recommendation that strays furthest into Gun Control territory, again because of its sweeping nature. How this doesn't apply to domestic gun ownership as written is something I just don't see. It's all very worthy, I just don't think it's very well aimed.