Caritas welcomes arms trade treaty

Refugee from fighting in DR Congo - image: Taylor Kakala/Caritas Congo

Caritas has welcomed the approval of the first global arms treaty at the United Nations. The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) comes after over six years of diplomatic talks. It means states are prohibited from exporting conventional weapons in violation of arms embargoes, or weapons that would be used for acts of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes or terrorism.

“It has been a long and complex journey but we hail this move which will make the international arms trade more transparent and accountable,” said Michel Roy, secretary general of Caritas Internationalis. “Now we must ensure that all governments comprehensively implement what has been agreed so that we can put in place yet another building block for global peace.”

Member States voted by 154 votes to three, with 23 abstentions, to control the global arms trade which has an annual turnover of $70 billion (€53.7 billion).

Caritas member organisations Secours Catholique (Caritas France), Caritas India, Caritas Congo and Caritas Colombia, with the help of Caritas head of delegation at the UN in New York, Joseph C. Donnelly have been part of a wider network of NGOs and campaigners who have been lobbying for a treaty for over ten years.

The devastating effects of wars fuelled by the arms trade are seen in developing communities across the world. The UN says that half a million people die because of armed violence each year.

Besides the physical damage, there is also the millions who flee their homes through fear each year as a result of conflict.

“Refugees know the costs of armed conflict better than anyone,” said António Guterres, the UN’s high commissioner for refugees. “For them in particular, as well as the millions more forcibly displaced inside their own countries by armed violence, the adoption of this treaty is badly needed.”

The treaty regulates all conventional arms such as battle tanks, armoured combat vehicles, large-calibre artillery systems, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, missiles and missile launchers, and small arms and light weapons.

See Caritas’s peacebuilding toolkit here: http://peacebuilding.caritas.org/index.php/Home