MISSING PIECES - Inter-Parliamentary Union

THEME 2
to embargoed groups and other undesirable users. Yet governments have
made almost no progress to halt such fraudulent practices. From time to
time, some governments have expressed interest in multilateral approaches
to improve end-use controls, but to date no common approach has been
forged on this basic issue. 36 Sweden has proposed the establishment of an
expert group within the UN framework to study the feasibility of developing
an EUC system at the regional and global levels, including information
exchange and verification, but the initiative has not met with much support. 37
BOX 8 IMPROVING AMMUNITION CONTROLS
. . . small arms and light weapons used in conflict require frequent supply of
ammunition and therefore enhanced controls on ammunition and its explosive
components and the manufacturing technology to produce them could be of
particular value in dealing with the existing dissemination of small arms and
light weapons and reducing the incidence of their use in conflict or postconflict
situations.
—Report of the Group of Experts on the problem of ammunition and explosives, 1999 38
Efforts to stem the human security crisis of armed violence undoubtedly
warrant a focus not only on weapons transfers, but also on ammunition.
Without ammunition, guns are non-functional. Ammunition comprises a
sizable part of the global authorised trade in small arms, but it is poorly
documented and illicit trafficking of ammunition is thought to be widespread.
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Acknowledging the importance of better understanding the policy
issues related to ammunition, in 1997 the UN General Assembly agreed to a
study of the issue. An Experts Group reported in 1999. However, little was
done on the issue at a global level until October 2006 when the UN General
Assembly First Committee decided to appoint a new GGE to consider ammunition
stockpiles.
The word ‘ammunition’ does not appear in the text of the PoA. However,
if the scope of the instrument’s coverage is guided by the 1997 UN Panel of
Experts’ definition of ‘small arms and light weapons’, it may be construed
to include ammunition. Ammunition is also explicitly or implicitly part of
the scope of a number of regional instruments, including the ECOWAS Convention,
the EU Code of Conduct, the OAS Model Regulations, and the SADC
Protocol, among others. Nevertheless, states have rarely tightened ammunition
supply controls, either because they believe it to be too difficult, or
ancillary to the ‘main concern’: the weapons themselves. 40 And the issue
was dealt a further blow when states failed to include ammunition within
the scope of the International Tracing Instrument.
One recent important exception to this trend is Brazil’s Disarmament
Statute, passed in December 2003, which requires that all Brazilian-produced
ammunition for the military and police be stamped with its lot number,
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