Foreign Secretary to push for global arms treaty
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw today will make the case for a wide-ranging international treaty on arms sales covering all conventional weapons.
In a keynote speech at the Institute of Civil Engineers in London, Mr Straw will argue a global arms trade treaty – drawing on the work by Oxfam, Amnesty International among others – will help enforce and monitor arms exports and sales.
“Many nations are concerned that a new treaty may restrict their defence industries,” he will say.
“But to work properly, it will need to include as many of the world’s nations as possible.”
Mr Straw will tell delegates that the treaty – hopefully endorsed by the United Nations – should honour agreements on weapons of mass destruction and cover smaller weapons as well such as rifles, revolvers, machineguns and mortars.
Such weapons, he will say, “account for far more misery and destruction across the world”.
The Control Arms campaign claims there are some 639 million small arms and light weapons around the world, with eight million more produced every year.
Campaigners claim conventional weapons kill a person every minute of very day with the market for conventional weapons estimated a £500bn a year.
Britain is the world’s second-biggest arms trader and the only member of the G8 of leading industrial nations to support the new treaty idea.
The conference is organised by Saferworld, a British-based pressure group pushing for better control of the arms trade.
