Human Wrongs Watch
While rights groups stress that the brutal crackdown on protesters in Syria and other Middle East and North Africa countries underlines the absence of a global regulation on the trade of conventional arms, a number of states –including U.S., China, and Russia– are rejecting the Inclusion of strong human rights safeguards in an international Arms Trade Treaty.
“Leaders currently seeking a veto over an Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) must stop playing chess with millions of innocent lives,” Amnesty International (AI) in a report.
The call came in the wake of a week-long meeting at the United Nations, hammering out details for the final ATT negotiation in July.
A UN preparatory committee concluded a final round of talks on Friday 17 Feb. to define the rules of procedure for the ATT). It issued a report that includes a “non-paper” that will be the basis of this summer’s talks.