John Duncan

Oslo treaty to ban cluster munitions

This week a bill has been introduced in Parliament to implement the UK’s obligations under the the Oslo treaty to ban cluster munitions. David Miliband, who signed the treaty last year on behalf of the UK, has welcomed this good news.

The negotiations of this ground breaking treaty were concluded in a record time of 18 months.  The Oslo Cluster Munitions treaty, as with the Ottawa landmines treaty before it, stands out as a testament to what can be achieved when Government, civil society and parliamentarians work together.  The debate can be noisy, but the result is well worth it.

As Gordon Brown and ministers commented at the end of the negotiations, UK leadership helped secure this significant step in banning a whole system of weapons that had been shown to cause quite unacceptable harm to civilians. Something we as diplomats should not forget; that beyond the intellectual and political arguments, it is whether what we do affects people on the ground that really matters.

CM Victims celebarating the  end of negotiations

But after the negotiation comes the hard slog of ratification before a treaty can come into force. 30 countries must ratify the treaty before the it becomes part of international law. Over 90 countries signed in Oslo almost a year ago.  A total of 103 countries have now signed and 24 have ratified. UK Minsters and officials are lobbying behind the scenes in many countries to ensure as many as possible sign up to the new treaty.

So now we pass the ball over to our parliamentarians, many of whom played a very active role in pressing for this new treaty. The first meeting of the State Parties is expected to take place in November next year. The swift passage of this legislation will mean the UK can attend this as a full State Party, and continue to play a leadership role on arms control.

Posted at 16:14 20 November 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]

Parting shots: The valedictory despatch vs the blog

I am sure many of us have enjoyed Mathew Paris’s series on the BBC about ambassadors “Valedictory” despatches.  Mathew’s intelligent and thoughtful commentary was only marred by the BBC choice of actors voices to play past ambassadors. If I was going to do a series on the BBC I don’t think I would choose to have everyone speak like Alvar Lidell! To be fair Mathew did try to get many former ambassadors to read their own despatches.

The programme implied that ending the formal valedictory despatch was an attempt to muzzle critics. It can also be argued that this semi private word to “The chaps back home” was inappropriate in the age of email, the internet (even SMS and Twitter).

Today’s Foreign Office has changed enormously from the one I joined in 1980. And the pace of change has accelerated in recent years. The successors to the ambassadors Mathew is quoting, are frequently a decade younger than would have been the case when those despatches were written.

The demise of the despatch does not mean diplomats have suddenly stopped sending frank messages to the centre. Several former colleagues commented the Valedictory was the moment, as we would put it today, “To speak truth to power” others quite rightly pointed out that this was fundamental to what an ambassador is employed to do.

Moreover as Charles Crawford commented in the programme, today’s ambassadors still have the option of  a Valedictory cable, or eGram as they are known, which arguably is more likely to be read and more quickly than the old despatch.  Equally the advent of blogging is helping to demystify the work of modern ambassadors; so you will not have to wait for an FOI request to find out what they thought. 

So thank you Mathew for giving air time to celebrate the old institution of  the Valedictory Despatch. I am sure today’s ambassadors will also find ways to share their thoughts at the end of their posting/careers just as  the BBC foreign correspondents Justin Webb and Mark Mardell did on perhaps the best edition this year of  From Our Own Correspondent.

Posted at 17:30 14 November 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]

Decision time at the United Nations

On Wednesday this week the UK and six other nations will seek agreement at the UN General Assembly to launch formal negotiations of a new Arms Trade Treaty after 3 years of discussion.

It will be a defining moment, but the last few weeks debate on the Resolution that contains the decision have shown that the ATT remains a contentious issue that can stir up  strong emotions. Even after 3 years there are still those who argue that its too soon or the conditions are not right to agree to start negotiating a new treaty.

The human and economic cost of armed conflict is calculated as 2000 people killed each day across the world and  $18 billion a year in Africa alone. Conflicts fuelled by weapons that get into the hands of  criminals, terrorists and insurgents because we have still not established effective regulation of the international arms trade. Not for nothing did the last UN Secretary General describe conventional weapons proliferation as “The real Weapons of Mass Destruction”

Hilary Clinton’s announcement 10 days ago that the US would “actively pursue a strong and robust treaty” was a step change in the American attitude and a very welcome one.

Some have argued that the US terms for coming on board are too high; others are concerned about creating new precedents in UN rules and procedures. One can only hope that when we gather to vote everyone will remember those who are outside the room, whose loved ones have been killed or abused, whose livelihood and hopes for the future rest on what the "men in suits" in New York decide one Wednesday afternoon.

Posted at 11:59 25 October 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[2]

Faith, Foreign Policy and Disarmament (Guest Blog)

This article is written by Francis Campbell, UK Ambassador to the Holy See.

Yesterday in the Foreign Office saw the first consultation meeting with faith groups interested in disarmament.  Sixteen delegates attended representing all the major faith groups.  We split the discussion into two parts: the first on the Arms Trade Treaty and the second on the Non Proliferation Treaty.  We wrapped up the meeting with a contribution from FCO Minister Ivan Lewis.

This was the first time we had undertaken such a consultation with faith groups on the subject of disarmament. Why a consultation with faith groups?  We want to replicate the success of working with faith groups on the Cluster Munitions Treaty which was signed last year. 

At the preparatory conferences, in particular at Wellington, the Holy See played a very active role in getting a practical workable agreement and in bridging divides to allow us to get a binding Treaty banning cluster munitions.  We see a similar role for faith groups in working towards an Arms Trade Treaty.  In engaging faith groups in the discussion we see three aspects.  There is the moral dimension that faith groups bring to the work of the Arms Trade Treaty. 

As history shows, faith groups are often at the forefront of righting wrongs and in providing the impetus for change.  Then there are the global grassroots networks which allow faith groups to communicate easily across cultures, languages and nations.  In Catholic terms alone, the Holy See speaks directly to 17.5% of the world’s population.  Finally, as faith groups engage each other in inter-religious dialogue there is scope to concentrate on ethical dialogue where there is a strong shared moral foundation.  Perhaps one of those ethical issues could be the international efforts to bring transparency to the sale and transfer of conventional weapons and to stamp out the illicit sales of such weapons through a binding international Arms Trade Treaty.

 
Yesterday we were simply testing the water to see if there was interest among faith groups in having such a conversation with the FCO on the Arms Trade Treaty and the Non Proliferation Treaty.  There was – and we agreed to continue with the group as we move forward on the ambitious timetable to achieve an Arms Trade Treaty.  But there was also interest from the group in having a wider discussion with the FCO on other foreign policy considerations.  The Minister agreed to look into that request and revert.

But yesterday was also important for reasons beyond what we had on our agenda. It was also symbolic of a new approach in foreign policy.  I have spoken on faith and foreign policy before and why religion was often ignored in foreign policy considerations for much of the post Second World War period. A 2007 report from the Washington based Centre for Strategic and International Studies catalogued the reasons why religion was often ignored in foreign policy and diplomacy and why it deserved to be taken seriously.  A former US Secretary of State – Madeline Albright – made a similar case in her book ‘The Mighty and the Almighty’. 

Much of the marginalisation of religion from foreign policy considerations was based on an assumption that the world was secularising and religion was of decreasing interest across the world (such an assumption was not confined to diplomacy alone). But there was a significant mistake in such a calculation because the secularisation model really only explained the pattern in Europe and some other parts of the Western world.  It did not capture the United States or the rest of the world where societies were as religious as ever or in some cases more so.  There was no proven universally applicable law of modernisation leading to secularisation. This point is more fully expanded in a speech I gave on ‘God in a Secular World’, but the basic point is that religion is an influence in world affairs and as such needs to be taken seriously.

Today, much has changed vis a vis faith and foreign policy.  We can point to strong working relations with faith groups on climate change, international development, conflict resolution and prevention, inter-religious dialogue, migration, human rights, etc.  If we can replicate the success of working with faith groups on the Jubilee Debt Campaign, Make Poverty History and the Cluster Munitions Treaty, by achieving an Arms Trade Treaty – then we can show again that faith matters in foreign policy and that it is a real asset when trying to solve many of the world’s problems.  Yesterday was a good start.

Posted at 15:08 22 October 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[1]

BLOG ACTION DAY 2009: THE NUCLEAR EQUATION

Climate change, perhaps the biggest issue for the world community. Twenty years ago I experienced this at first hand in Sudan. To see the inexorable spread of the the Sahara southwards engulfing villages and fields that only a few years before had been fertile land was a real personal wake up call.

Today I am very conscious of the environmental aspect of our work in Arms Control & Disarmament. How to ensure that development of civil nuclear power is not diverted into nuclear weapon programmes is at the heart of what we are about. But on the conventional side too the environmental damage caused by landmines and cluster munitions is not only the fact that explosives, including heavy metals leach into the soil, but as agricultural land becomes too dangerous too use, people are often  forced to clear new land, increasing deforestation. 

It will be a major challenge to meet the  demand for energy across the world from renewable energy sources. Nuclear energy will be part of the solution. Gordon Brown set out our vision on this issue in his speech at Lancaster House conference earlier this year.

In my statement today at the UN I referred to David Miliband's comment that “Get it right, and we will increase global security, pave the way for a world without nuclear weapons, and improve access to affordable, safe and dependable energy. Get it wrong, and we face a new and dangerous era of new state nuclear weapon holders and the chilling prospect of nuclear material falling into the hands of terrorists.” 

Posted at 10:41 15 October 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]

FIRST DAY AT FIRST COMMITTEE

I am not going to bombard my readership with a blow by blow account of of discussions in New York, but the opening day is always interesting to judge the mood music for what follows and today was no exception.

My day started with an EU meeting to discuss  “last minute” changes to our general statement. After 30 hours often difficult discussion in Geneva one would have thought everything had been agreed. But it is one of the minor irritations of multilateral diplomacy that some capitals don’t pay attention until the text is close to or has been finalised and then someone has a "bright idea" and sends new instructions. It is the bane of those who have to reopen the discussion and there were quite a few barbed comments around the table. Fortunately it doesn’t happen too often to UK ambassadors any more. The new ways of working based around the idea of our missions and London colleagues forming a “Virtual Team” in an ongoing dialogue means we usually manage to avoid these last minute surprises.

Today’s plenary debate was mostly taken up by such statements by regional and other groups such as the Non Aligned Movement (NAM) from which it was clear that the EU is not alone in wrestling to produce a common view.  Much staking out of old ground on which the unwritten text was  “The Security Council may have delivered a new vision, but don’t forget my project from the early 90’s (or even earlier)”

Once we moved into national statements the pace started to hot up.  Mexico delivered a passionate, wide ranging and articulate vision of what they saw as the priorities. While we might not agree on all of the points, one cannot but welcome the change of tone their intervention introduced to the debate.

The US address the plenary tomorrow. It will be a keynote in both senses of the word.

Tomorrow also sees the first open discussion on our new resolution to launch negotiations on the Arms Trade Treaty. Still a contentious issue after 3 years discussion it will consume a lot of my teams time and energy over the next 4 weeks.

The other element of particular note was the measured tone of the Iranian “right of response” to some quite firm comments by the EU about the recent revelations about the uranium enrichment site near Qom. After the generally productive outcome from last week’s talks in Geneva, perhaps we are at last moving beyond the “shouting across the table” that has often characterised the wider arms control and disarmament community's discussion of the Iranian nuclear issue.

One can but hope.  As they say “Optimism is to the diplomat what courage is to the soldier”

Posted at 00:05 06 October 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]

RECOVERING THE RELEVANCE OF MULTILATERAL ARMS CONTROL

The last two weeks have seen some good progress in the world community’s efforts to break out from the “Decade of Deadlock” in multilateral Arms Control in Disarmament with the US Inspired UN Security Council Summit and this week in Geneva a more positive resumption of the talks between Iran and the E3 +3.

Over the next 4 weeks in New York the UN General Assembly First Committee will meet for it’s annual overview of the Arms Control & Disarmament agenda. Some 50 plus resolutions will be tabled, voted on and submitted to the main UNGA.

Often described as the “litmus test” of world opinion (do people still use litmus paper!) this year's meeting will certainly be a test of whether the Arms Control community can respond to the new energy that Pres. Obama has injected into the debate since his Prague speech last April.

In my last post I contrasted the debate in the UNSC Summit with that of the General Assembly. We may well see the same thing again with those who do not buy-in to the new agenda of a collective endeavour to get the world back on track towards a World Free of Nuclear Weapons "The Road to 2010",   or just trot out the tired old mantras; rather like Cato the elder in the Roman Senate exhorting that “Carthage must be destroyed” long after it had been.

For the UK this meeting will be a pivotal one as it will be the moment when the General Assembly decides whether to launch formal negotiation of a new Arms Trade Treaty. After 3 years discussion we and the 6 original co-authors of this initiative (Argentina, Australia, Costa Rica, Finland, Japan, Kenya) are proposing that a negotiating Conference is established to draft and agree the treaty.

So on both the nuclear and conventional side  the next 4 weeks will be a test of whether the UNGA can step up and respond effectively to the challenges we face in today’s world.

I will be blogging and also posting on Twitter from New York for those who want to follow the debate.

Posted at 07:24 03 October 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]

A MOMENTOUS WEEK IN ARMS CONTROL AND DISARMAMENT

Gordon Brown described this week’s unanimous endorsement of UNSCR 1877 on Non Proliferation  and Disarmament  as a “Watershed Moment” . Yesterday events took a more ominous turn with the further revelations about Iran’s nuclear programme.

The week did in many ways provided a snapshot for the wider public of the damage done by the “Decade of Deadlock” in Multilateral Arms Control and Disarmament and the challenges we face over the next  8 months on the road to the Non Proliferation Treaty Review Conference.

It was certainly inspiring to see world leaders speak directly, often without notes to these important issues in The Security Council. The current fifteen members of the Security Council represent a broad span of world opinion. Their individual views on nuclear weapons are quite divergent and yet they were able to agree on an historic resolution setting out the action that needs to take place for us all to move along the path towards a world where the threat of nuclear attack is removed and where nuclear power can be used safely as part of the solution to the challenges of climate change. The sort of Coalition of Consent that David Miliband has talked about.

What a contrast with the UN General Assembly the day before where some speakers simply trotted out the tired old mantras about where the blame lay for the worlds ills and sought to reject the vision of an interconnected and interdependent world and the need for collective endeavour.

Col Gaddafi’s public views do a disservice to the leading role that other Arab countries are playing in this field, for example it was Algeria that led the way to an agreement to unblock the Conference in Disarmament earlier this year.

But more worrying than the misplaced rhetoric, is that at time when the five established Nuclear Weapons States publicly reaffirmed in the UN Security Council Resolution their commitment to progressively dismantle their nuclear armouries, others (not Libya it has to be said) seem determined to disrupt, if not overtly block, progress towards a world free of nuclear weapons and the safe development of civil nuclear power. Nor can it escape anyone’s notice, that the two countries who are at the centre stage in blocking progress, are themselves armed with nuclear weapons, or suspected of seeking to acquire them.

Extreme views, be they in the domestic or international environment, are rarely defeated by posturing from the moral high ground. The mainstream have to speak up, engage and work together as they did this week in the Security Council.

The coming weeks will show whether we are able to do so, as the international community grapples with how to respond to the latest Iranian revelations and as the UN General Assembly’s First Committee (meeting from 5 Oct-4 Nov) considers the broad spectrum of the Arms Control and Disarmament agenda.

Further links on the UK position and to follow the debate are below.

FCO Webpage on the Road to 2010 Nuclear Disarmament  & Non Proliferation

Posted at 11:13 26 September 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]

What Does Government 2.0 Mean To You?

In my blog I recently argued that communication was one of the core tasks of a professional diplomat. With the next major summit of Gov20 taking place in Washington in a few weeks, I have also posted in the Reuters “Great Debate” blog series some personal thoughts on how and why diplomacy is responding to the challenge and opportunities of web-based communication. Below is the text of that blog.

I came to this as someone who worked on mainframes in the 1970s, whose first PC was a AMSTRAD PCW with 512 KB memory. With that background and living in Switzerland, just down the road from where the world wide web was invented (CERN) it is perhaps not surprising that I view this technology largely as a range of new tools.

It is true that the improvements over the subsequent 30 years are extraordinary. My daughter’s iPod shuffle has more storage capacity than our home PC of only a decade ago. But, having once jammed an IBM mainframe in a perpetual loop, I am also conscious of the “Rubbish in–Rubbish out” principle. The tools are only as good as the use one makes of them.

The speed of communication and the geographical reach is equally extraordinary; developing the reality of an interconnected and interdependent world and new virtual communities. The arrival of these new means of communication is perhaps even more important and encouraging given the parallel development in the more traditional media, particularly television, of news as entertainment.

If net-based communication is changing the way we all access information and opinion, the impact on diplomacy and government affairs may well be equally profound; perhaps most significantly in terms of transparency and democratic accountability.

Both multilateral and bilateral ambassadors spend much of our time communicating the view of governments, both those of our own and those to whom we are accredited. So it can be said that we are often “marketing” ideas — what does the world we want look like and how to get there. It is noticeable that the diplomatic community reacts just as badly to spin as does the general public.

World Bank President Robert Zoellick commented in his address to the International Institute for Strategic Studies last year in Geneva, that: “ The interconnections of globalisation require our generation to recognise anew the nexus among economics, governance, and security”. So the 21st century diplomatic agenda is also a more complex one.

Traditionally diplomatic interlocutors can be divided into decision makers and opinion formers. Governments are not bureaucratic monoliths. Rarely are more than six people key to a decision. Our task as diplomats is to find those key players and convince them.

Opinion formers act as the multipliers. Having a well argued case is seldom enough by itself. Human beings still retain their tribal instincts, in sport as in politics and foreign affairs. We seem hardwired to view things all too often in terms of “us and them”, and diplomacy is no exception. Diplomats need the opinion formers as the people who give the “third-party endorsement” that reinforces our message; a classic marketing technique to respond to a trust deficit.

The internet allows the creation of a new world-wide “us” of shared interests and values. Social media networks and the blogoshpere provide new tools to speak directly to that wider community of actors that Zoellick refers to; going beyond the confines of traditional state-to-state interface, to test and be challenged on our ideas in a dialogue and sometimes in a partnership with civil society.

The figures speak for themselves. At an average international meeting one is talking to between perhaps 27-200 diplomatic colleagues. A post on the perhaps unfortunately named Twitter may get up to 800 or more, with a blog post several thousand.

And the numbers alone are not really the point. The net, Facebook and Twitter have more than their fair share of the minutiae of celebrity lives and get rich quick promoters, but the “political” virtual communities are self selecting and can filter out this background noise.They comprise a wide range of people from think tanks to journalists, students, to members of the public who care about the issues and are often willing to become involved with other decision makers. They offer direct access to the community that may provide third-party endorsement and at its best the creation of a constituency for change.

There are some who claim that these communities are essentially English speaking, if not Anglo-Saxon. The evidence suggests otherwise. It is clear that a number of those who regularly follow me on Twitter do not have English as a mother tongue. Some of the most successful FCO blogging ambassadors, such as Mark Kent in Vietnam and Alan Charlton in Brazil write in the language of the countries they are accredited to.  The Foreign Office uses close to 40 languages in its net-based communication.

For government officials, engagement with this new virtual community is a challenge. It is unfamiliar and fraught with the risk of making mistakes. But there are also opportunities to multiply the effect of what we are already trying to do.

However one of the important lessons from the last two decades it is that we should be careful to avoid allowing our enthusiasm for new ideas and a new world order to cause us to underestimate the opposition to change.  The international arena has given us some sharp reminders on that score. In the end we still have to persuade the decision makers. The Internet simply offers new and powerful ways to do so. Officials and governments should, and many are, seizing the opportunity

Posted at 16:59 04 September 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[1]

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Posted at 19:38 01 September 2009 by e-Media Global  |  Comments[0]

THE END OF DIPLOMACY AS WE KNOW IT?

This week Europe’s World magazine published a blog by the former British diplomat Carne Ross claiming “It is time to scrap ambassadors” Another former colleague Charles Crawford has responded on his own blog; so it is perhaps time for a serving Ambassador to give a view from the inside.

Certainly today’s ambassadors face major challenges to the way we do business and the need to demonstrate value for money in a climate of severe pressure on the public purse. But I tend to agree with many of Charles’ points and that Carne’s piece reflects some rather old fashioned views. I am old enough to remember the CPRS report that embassies could be replaced by the fax.

Paradoxically today’s Foreign Service is in some ways returning to its roots, to the task of communicating. If the core task of a diplomat was simply to faithfully represent the views of governments then Carne Ross might have a point. But it is more than this. Diplomacy involves an understanding of how to communicate those views to others.;  the building of personal relationships and trust. Diplomats need to be able to explain both sides of an argument, their own governments policy and the response of other governments to that.  It involves a degree of empathy (but not necessarily sympathy) to find out where the cross over in shared interest lies in order to form what David Miliband has described as“Coalitions of Consent”.  

Governments and the public service must respond to the communication revolution created by the internet and modern IT. Here Carne Ross is right and this is in fact happening in both the US and UK with the Gov20 phenomena . David Miliband himself a regular blogger will attend the next Gov 2.0 Summit in Washington next month. If this revolution reinforces the need for diplomat’s to have good  communication skills, it also allows us to achieve the restructuring of the  Foreign Service overseas operation that has been in train for well over a decade.

In the early 90s as the Soviet Union collapsed I was part of a group of (then young) diplomats opening new embassies across Eastern Europe. It was impossible to in the time and with the funds available to set up the traditional British embassy with all the trimmings, so we had to create a “virtual presence” often operating out of hotels, or in shared premises. Our teams were small and everyone from minsters to businessmen wanted to learn about and visit these countries and their new leaderships. Frequently we needed to bring in additional staff for short periods to share a workload that even larger embassies would have found a challenge.

Today the UK Arms Control mission in Geneva follows that same model. Only 10% of staff are permanently based here. The remainder only join us when and for as long as, their expertise is needed.  Modern communications tools;  from video conferencing to email and the internet, make this a viable  and cost effective approach.  Across the FCO network embassy’s are looking at these sorts of options.  Our bilateral embassies in the Nordic/Baltic countries already work as a network by pooling their expertise on a regional basis.  Bilateral Ambassadors  in addition to their traditional role and to providing a service to British citizens and companies, work increasingly on behalf of  a variety of  UK government departments and through both traditional and new players such as the NGO community.

It would be naïve to assume that such a sea change is anything other than difficult or without its detractors. But the professional life of an ambassador is already a far cry from that portrayed by spy fiction writers, chocolate manufacturers or indeed Carne himself.

In the next few days I will offer some further personal reflections on  “Diplomacy as marketing”  and the new communication agenda  in my blog on the Reuters Great Debate site.

Posted at 14:22 28 August 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[6]

Why Does UK Industry Support an Arms Trade Treaty?

This article is written by Brinley Salzman of the UK Defence Manufacturers Association. The views expressed here are the DMA’s and do not necessarily represent the views of the British Government.

An initiative that genuinely seeks to establish a global benchmark in export control compliance is to be welcomed and supported. Industry has an important role to play at this vitally important time in the development of the ATT. Defence Industry is already heavily regulated, but that regulation is not universal in scope or effect. This uneven landscape provides one of the key arguments deployed in support of an ATT.

What arms should an ATT control? It must not be limited in scope compared to the range of military systems that might be relevant to the purpose of any ATT and that many countries have already control. An ATT must not exacerbate the problem of an uneven regulatory landscape. A balance must be struck between comprehensiveness and regulatory burden.

How should arms be controlled? Responsible industry recognises that defence exports are at the heart of the foreign and security policy interests of any State. A Treaty would require states to consider their existing obligations under international law; but many nations appear to have differing views on how those obligations should be interpreted and brought to bear on export licensing decisions.
 
It is recognised that Governments have the moral and practical responsibility to implement controls responsibly, fairly and transparently. But how could this be brought together into a coherent package in a community of vastly different interests?

Industry has an important role to play. The moral arguments for an ATT, that underpin human security, social and economic development, are not incompatible with good business practice. Corporate responsibility is a fundamental part of good business strategy. Ethical and responsible business gives competitive commercial advantage.

The concept of a ‘level playing field’ is important during global economic crisis. Pressure on Industry and Governments is growing. Driven, at least in part, by smaller slices of the cake being available to high-value manufacturers, this pressure presents the increased risk of some suppliers entering or revisiting markets that, until recently, would have been considered off limits. This would be a highly undesirable outcome.

The global supply chain supports many thousands of skilled jobs in many parts of the world. Defence Industry is, therefore, a catalyst for high-value manufacturing growth in developed and developing economies. Openness in the world trade system is essential for successful growth, but that trade must be carried out both responsibly and securely. A Treaty that clearly establishes the highest common standards and transparency of implementation can go a long way toward achieving this.

Final exports of defence materiel must be licensed, but the bureaucracy attached to the international movement of components in the supply chain must be reduced. There are countries where we would welcome the opportunity to place work for reasons both of cost and of the availability of skilled people; our ability to do so is limited at present. An ATT must give Governments confidence to trust the extension of the supply chain and reduce bureaucracy.

The potential, long-term benefits of a Treaty to regulate the trade in conventional arms extends beyond Defence Industry: spin-off benefits of good governance, transparency and stability feed into inward investment, supply-chain security and economic growth that allow for poverty reduction and respect for human rights.

There are many arguments in favour of an ATT, but a broader horizon is required, based on the way we characterise an ATT. It should not be viewed through the optic of a traditional disarmament or arms control instrument. It is a new way for the international community to address the inter-relationships between conflict, poverty, development, human rights and trade. All sectors, health, education, agriculture should be engaged in this debate and appreciate the opportunities for growth and security.

Posted at 16:42 16 July 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]

MOSCOW: A FOLLOW ON TO START

There has been a wide welcome amongst governments and also by the think tank community for the announcement of a’ Joint understanding’ by Presidents Obama and Medvedev earlier this week to reduce their nuclear arsenals to below 1,700 warheads each and their commitment to co-operate more closely on non-proliferation.

With the existing START Treaty due to expire in December this year, the priority has been to get something in place before then. A tall order given the slow pace of Arms Control and Disarmament diplomacy for much of the past decade. And the fact that the US and Russian negotiating teams have been hard at work in Geneva over the past weeks involving some of their best diplomats. This week’s announcement should therefore be seen as a step in a longer process. The US’s still has to complete its own Nuclear Posture Review. These are issues go to the heart of the nation state’s responsibilities – to protect and safeguard its citizens. This is not an area for “gesture politics”. More a time to start putting the substance into the bold vision that both presidents articulated in London and Prague earlier this year.

But we can see that Russia and the US are well on track, reflecting the increasing willingness of the nuclear weapons states to co-operate on nuclear issues and in particular on disarmament. This will be particularly important as we approach the NPT Review Conference next spring.

For our part, the UK has been working hard to strengthen the consensus across all pillars of the NPT. As Gordon Brown commented in his Lancaster House speech and again in the Building Britain’s future paper , we have to confront interconnected challenges of our global society, where the nuclear question is a central issue that plays into many, if not all of them

Posted at 11:41 08 July 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[1]

CLUSTER MUNITIONS BAN: BUILDING BRITAIN’S FUTURE

Today the  Prime Minister published a major consultation exercise on the Draft Legislative Programme (DLP) including a Cluster Munitions Prohibitions Bill to give effect to the UK’s obligations under the Oslo Treaty signed by David Miliband at the end of last year.
 
The Plan called “Building Britain’s Future” calls for the United Kingdom to show leadership on a wider scale in driving forward a step-change on the nuclear non-proliferation and multilateral disarmament agenda in 2010.

The new bill on cluster munitions will create the criminal offences to enforce the Oslo Treaty's ban on the use, development, production,stockpiling, retention or transfer of cluster munitions, and thereby pave the way for the UK's ratification of this most significant new arms control agreement in recent years.
 
The Oslo Treaty (or more correctly the Convention on Cluster Munitions), and this Bill, will advance our goal of tackling the humanitarian and security threats posed by conventional weapons to regional and global stability, security and sustainable development.

To take part in this online consultation Building Britain's Future follow the links above.
 

Posted at 17:00 29 June 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]

Arms Trade Treaty: Guest Blog from Kate Allen, Director Amnesty (UK)

This article is written by Kate Allen, Director of Amnesty International UK. The views expressed here are Amnesty's and do not necessarily represent the views of the British Government.

Today’s special event at the Foreign Office, where Amnesty school, colleges and university group members will meet government representatives to discuss plans and aspirations for an Arms Trade Treaty, is particularly inspiring and extremely important for us here at Amnesty International.

It signifies the benefits of assiduous and unfaltering campaigning by young people across the UK who have supported the call for an international Arms Trade Treaty by Amnesty International and our partners in the Control Arms Campaign – Oxfam and IANSA. 

Without tireless efforts from school and student groups the Control Arms Campaign would not have been able to have achieved what it has so far.

An effective Arms Trade Treaty is long overdue. Latest figures reveal that armed violence kills approximately 740,000 people each year – that’s more than one person every minute of every day.
 
About one in three of all serious human rights violations reported by Amnesty involves the use of arms and guns are used in 85 per cent of all killings around the world.

Such shocking statistics have probably compelled many young people to take action and to press for an Arms Trade Treaty.  I am delighted to see so many and such a variety of creative products and petitions from our school and student groups urging the UK Government to push at international level for this important Treaty. Such efforts have led to the significant progress we’ve seen internationally so far.

Through the efforts of the UK Government and other supportive governments in 2006, there was international agreement to support the idea of an Arms Trade Treaty, and last year 137 governments voted to start formal discussions on the Treaty.

Pressure from school, college and university Amnesty groups has clearly been valuable for the UK Government in making such progress on an international level.  But despite such achievements, we cannot afford to lose sight of the fact that there is a long road ahead before an effective Arms Trade Treaty is in place. 

The Arms Trade Treaty has to be robust enough to save lives.  It has to ensure that upholding human rights is at its core, and it must be based on the golden rule that arms must never be supplied where they are likely to be used to commit human rights violations.

Without such watertight rules, the Treaty will be next to useless.

A lot still hangs in the balance for the development of an effective Treaty, and so the Control Arms Campaign still needs the tireless efforts and creativity of our young campaigners to secure strong international legislation.

Today’s meeting is a real milestone for the scores of students and school-pupils who will meet UK Government representatives. We hope that it will inspire and reinvigorate both our young campaigners and the UK Government to continue to achieve a successful, robust and effective international Arms Trade Treaty.  

Posted at 14:07 15 June 2009 by John Duncan  |  Comments[0]