MISSING PIECES - Inter-Parliamentary Union
MISSING PIECES - Inter-Parliamentary Union
MISSING PIECES - Inter-Parliamentary Union
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THEME 5<br />
Many governments also provide significant financial and technical<br />
support to countries that need assistance with stockpile security and destruction<br />
of surplus weapons, either bilaterally or channelled through other<br />
organisations or mechanisms including the OSCE, the South Eastern<br />
Europe Clearinghouse for the Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons,<br />
and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s (NATO) Partnership for Peace<br />
(PfP) Trust Fund. For example, NATO PfP small arms destruction projects<br />
have been completed or are in progress in a number of countries in Eastern<br />
Europe and the Caucasus, including Albania, Georgia, Ukraine, and<br />
Serbia and Montenegro.<br />
7. Confidence-building measures<br />
Weapons collection and DDR are often implemented in highly charged<br />
political environments. It is therefore important to be as transparent as<br />
possible about the objectives of these exercises and the procedures involved.<br />
Common questions include: Will guns and ammunition really be destroyed?<br />
If not, will they be kept safely? Will they fall into the wrong hands? Providing<br />
information and communicating with the public through media and<br />
other means, including the organisation of public destruction ceremonies,<br />
have proven successful in increasing confidence and accountability. Civil<br />
society organisations, including NGOs, churches, and the private sector,<br />
have all participated actively in weapons collection programmes around<br />
the world and constitute a key channel of communication. If handled well,<br />
a disarmament programme may in fact contribute to confidence building.<br />
Parliamentarians can be particularly active in establishing weapons collection<br />
schemes and explaining the process to the public.<br />
8. Take stock − Learn lessons<br />
Even very basic lessons learned are continually, if not consistently, ignored.<br />
As an illustration, in May 2004, US forces in Iraq launched a gun buy-back<br />
programme in Baghdad, offering people large cash sums in exchange for<br />
guns. It was these cash payments that attracted participants rather than a<br />
genuine wish to disarm, and the money has been used in some cases to<br />
buy new guns. 12 The programme did not have any noticeable impact in<br />
terms of reducing the vast number of military weapons in various hands in<br />
Iraq—let alone increasing human security.<br />
‘We sell [the Americans] the old ones and buy new ones on the black<br />
market’, said Ali Mohsin [an Iraqi citizen]. ‘I sold one AK-47 that I<br />
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