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654 Travaux préparatoires: United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime“(a) Require, at the time of manufacture of each firearm, the appropriatemarking of the name of its manufacturer, its place of manufacture and its [serialnumber]; 29“[(b) Require appropriate markings on each imported firearm [following itsimportation for the purpose of commercial sale within the importing country, orpermanent private importation], permitting the identification of the importer’s nameand address [and an individual serial number if the firearm does not bear one at thetime of import] [so that the source of the firearm can be traced]; 30 and“(c) [[Require] the appropriate marking of any firearm confiscated or forfeitedpursuant to article 7 of this Protocol that is retained for official use;] 31“[(d) Require, at the time of transfer of a firearm from government stocks topermanent civilian use, the appropriate marking of the place of transfer and serialnumber.] 32“[1 bis The firearms referred to in article 2, subparagraph (b) (ii), of thisProtocol should be marked appropriately at the time of manufacture, if possible.] 33“2. States Parties shall encourage the firearm manufacturing industry todevelop measures to guard against the removal of markings.”29At the eleventh session of the Ad Hoc Committee, the format and content of markings to be applied were discussedextensively and remained one of the issues still open when the meeting adjourned. A number of proposals were made todescribe the markings for all firearms, imported firearms or firearms produced exclusively for a State party’s military orsecurity forces. These included “the codes used to identify the country and factory of origin, the year of production, the lotnumber and the calibre” (Colombia, see A/AC.254/L.247); “serial number” (European Commission, see A/AC.254/L.260);“serial number or unique numeric code” (Canada, see A/AC.254/L.264); “serial number or any other unique alphanumericcode” (Mexico); “unique numeric or alphanumeric marking” (working group, see A/AC.254/L.266, and Vice-Chairman, seeA/AC.254/L.271); “unique markings permitting ready identification” (Vice Chairman, see A/AC.254/L.271); and “appropriateunique marking” or “appropriate simple marking” (Chairman, see A/AC.254/4/Add.2/Rev.6, annex).30Many delegations supported the idea of requiring additional marking at the time of import, but concerns remainedabout the costs and practicality of this and about who (importers, exporters or government agencies) would actually do themarking. At the eleventh session of the Ad Hoc Committee, there was further discussion of import marking. Generally, theposition of some delegations that import marking was unnecessary or impracticable were contingent on the establishmentof a clear obligation to mark all firearms in a “user friendly” way at the time of manufacture. This was seen as preferablein order to ensure that any firearms subsequently diverted from state control would previously have been marked. If theprotocol did not require user friendly marking or did not apply to firearms made exclusively for a State party’s military orsecurity forces at the time of manufacture, many of the delegations that would otherwise regard import marking as unnecessarywould then see it as necessary and proposals that would make it more practicable were considered. These includedlimiting the requirement to firearms imported for commercial sale or permanent private retention and firearms that had notbeen previously marked (European Commission, see A/AC.254/L.260) and limiting the content of import marking andexempting temporary imports completely (informal working group, see A/AC.254/L.266; Vice Chairman, seeA/AC.254/L.271; and Chairman, see A/AC.254/4/Add.2/Rev.6, annex).31At the eleventh session of the Ad Hoc Committee, an informal working group set up to recommend changes to article9 recommended the deletion of this provision (see A/AC.254/L.266). That proposal was incorporated into subsequentproposals, which did not find consensus for other reasons (Vice Chairman, see A/AC.254/L.271; and Chairman, seeA/AC.254/4/Add.2/Rev.6, annex).32At the eleventh session of the Ad Hoc Committee, there was general support for the principle of ensuring thatfirearms transferred from government stocks to private circulation were marked in such a way as to identify the transferringState party and the individual firearm involved. The major issue still open, as with other paragraphs of this article,involved the exact format and content of the markings to be applied to such firearms. New proposals for this paragraphappeared in documents A/AC.254/L.260 (European Commission); A/AC.254/L.264 (Canada); A/AC.254/L.266 (workinggroup); A/AC.254/L.271 (Vice Chairman); and A/AC.254/4/Add.2/Rev.6, annex (Chairman).33See footnote 28 above.