Natural Resources and Violent Conflict - WaterWiki.net

where did it come from? 141treaty contains the central provision that decrees the mutual abeyanceof parties’ territorial claims and ambitions on the continent, althoughspecifically without prejudicing their future positions on the issue.CCAMLR inherited this unresolved jurisdiction and consensus approachto decisionmaking from the Antarctic Treaty System, both ofwhich have hindered subsequent attempts to crack down on illegaland unregulated fishing in the CCAMLR area.Similarly, although the Basel convention requires setting up systemsto ensure that participants “exercise due care” in the waste trade,no attempt is made to regulate its volume, organizational complexity,or geopolitical reach (Wynn 1989, p. 137). This approach sharplycontrasts with the Montreal protocol where explicit controls on productionand consumption of CFCs and other gases are central tointernational efforts to protect the ozone layer. “The inability of thedeveloping countries to obtain a North-South ban in the context of the[initial negotiations surrounding] the Basel convention shaped the futuredevelopment and tone of all subsequent negotiations,” not least inshifting the axis of negotiation away from discussing the environmentallysound management of industrial processes. Indeed, “neither thethird world nor the developed countries pressed for a definition thatwould address the major problem underlying the hazardous waste trade:the polluting and toxic nature of many industrial processes. AlthoughNGOs [nongovernmental organizations] such as Greenpeace identifiedthe existence of dirty industries as a significant problem to beaddressed, the priority for developing countries was the issue of thehazardous waste trade itself” (Miller 1995, p. 97). Political recognitionhas only recently occurred that regulating transboundary movementsshould be part of a broader strategy of waste management to generateless waste and to uncouple industrial activity from environmentaldamage.Lack of Government Transparency, Governance Failures, andCorruption. Civil strife and breakdown of government have createdconditions that allow illegal trade to flourish. Beyond simply renderinga government incapable of fulfilling its tracking obligations, rulingelites may actively abet such disorder to preside over massive publiclosses for their private gain.Revenues from illegal logging, for example, may exacerbate nationaland regional conflict. In turn, the state of emergency from such conflictsmay allow for the leakage of formal state revenues, which would befar more difficult in peacetime. Examples include Cambodia, wherethe timber trade funded the genocidal Khmer Rouge; the DemocraticRepublic of Congo, where the world’s largest timber concession (about