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November 2024 E-News

In the past five weeks, the disarmament community met for its yearly meeting in the UN General Assembly First Committee on Disarmament and International Security. Despite the opposition of heavily militarised states, some hard-won progress was achieved with the adoption of important resolutions. Before the end of the year, there are still a few more disarmament conferences taking place, including the meetings of the Convention on Conventional Weapons, the Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction, the Fifth Review Conference of the Mine Ban Treaty, among others. In all of them, states will have to ensure to assert the prevalence of multilateralism over militarisation and to prevent further death and destruction. You find more information about these upcoming meetings in this newsletter, which we hope will provide inspiration for action!

In this edition:

Current and upcoming disarmament meetings 

Meeting of High Contracting Parties to the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW)

The Meeting of High Contracting Parties to the CCW is taking place in Geneva, Switzerland, from 13–15 November 2024. Want to catch up on what happened during meetings of the 2024 Group of Governmental Experts on lethal autonomous weapon systems? Check out earlier editions of the CCW Report. You can also subscribe to receive coverage of the meeting!

Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction

The Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction is going to be held from 18 to 22 November 2024 in New York. 

Fifth Review Conference of the Mine Ban Treaty

The Fifth Review Conference (5RC) of the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Antipersonnel Mines and on Their Destruction will be held in Siem Reap, Cambodia from 25–29 November 2024.

Open-Ended Working Group on Information and Communication Technologies

The Open-Ended Working Group on Information and Communication Technologies (OEWG on ICTs) is meeting for its ninth substantive session on 2–6 December 2024 in New York.

Working Group and Meeting of States Parties to the Biological Weapons Convention 

The fifth session of the Working Group on the Strengthening of the Biological Weapons Convention will take place at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland from 2 to 13 December 2024. The 2024 Meeting of States Parties will take place in the same place from 16 to 18 December 2024.

Third Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons 

The Third Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) will take place on 3 to 7 March 2025 in New York, with Kazakhstan serving as President. If you are a WILPF member who wants to attend the meeting, please contact Laura Varella ([email protected]) before 5 December 2024, so that we can include your name in the accreditation letter!

Recently concluded disarmament meetings 

UN First Committee

The 79th session of the UN General Assembly First Committee on Disarmament and International Security took place in New York from 7 October to 8 November 2024. Despite the opposition of heavily militarised states, the First Committee was able to adopt several important resolutions, among them a resolution that establishes a group of 21 scientific experts to conduct a UN study on the effects of nuclear war (L.39). This study can build renewed public understanding of the risks and dangers of nuclear weapons, which in turn can help bolster momentum for their elimination. Another important resolution adopted was L.74, which decided to hold a meeting on nuclear justice, which can likewise help draw attention to the very real harms caused by nuclear weapons and help support the work underway for victim assistance and environmental remediation. Regarding autonomous weapons, L.77 decided to hold two informal consultations in New York in 2025, which can help elevate the issue among more delegations, ensure a more comprehensive assessment of the risks and challenges posed by such weapons, and build momentum for their prohibition. For more on the meeting, read our First Committee Monitor  and access statements, documents, resolutions and more at our First Committee page

Stop Arming Israel

In the past month, Israel continued to unleash its unlawful, immoral, and unconscionable violence against people of the Middle East. On top of the genocide of Palestinians and the war against Lebanon, Israel’s parliament voted to ban the UN’s Palestine aid agency, UNRWA. A few weeks later, the Israeli government notified the UN about the decision, which will take effect at the end of January. This move was strongly condemned by the international community, including by Ireland, Norway, Slovenia, and Spain, which issued a joint statement following the Israeli’s partlament decision.

The UN continues to document Israel’s war crimes and call for action from states to end the bloodshed.  The UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, Francesca Albanese, presented a new report titled “Genocide as colonial erasure,” which examined the unfolding horrors in the occupied Palestinian territory and calls on states to “intervene now to prevent new atrocities that will further scar human history.” A few weeks before that, a group of more than 30 UN experts signed a letter urging states to comply with the ICJ Advisory Opinion that declared Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories as unlawful under international law. The experts called on all states to “impose a full arms embargo on Israel, halting all arms agreements, imports, exports and transfers, including of dual-use items that could be used against the Palestinian population under occupation.” 

A growing number of countries have been supporting an arms embargo on Israel, including Türkiye and Egypt. However, a few states continue to supply Israel with weapons, components, and fuel. Spain has suspended both arms sales and purchases with Israel, with no new arms export authorisations granted; however, questions remain on whether previous contracts are still active. The United Kingdom announced that it was suspending around 30 arms export sales to Israel, but it exempted components for Israel's F-35 aircraft that are used to bomb Gaza. Canada also continues to arm Israeldespite an announcement of the suspension of some licences.

In this regard, in October 2024 the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW Committee) published its Concluding Observations on Canada, in which it expressed concern with insufficient information on policies preventing direct or indirect arms transfers to third countries, including Israel, for use in conflict zones where they might facilitate violations of women’s and girls’ human rights as well as of international humanitarian law, notably in Gaza. This followed the joint submission received by the Committee calling for the revision of Canada's "Complicity in Violations of Women’s Rights to Maternal Healthcare in Gaza" (the submission is featured bellow in our “Recommendation of the Month.”) In another example of action being taken to stop Canada from fuelling Israel’s genocide, lawyers representing two Palestinian-Canadian Plaintiffs have commenced legal proceedings against the Canadian Federal Government alleging violations of the Genocide Convention and the Plaintiff's Charter Rights. In addition, Canadian actvists are organising a National Day of Action against Canada’s contribution to supply F-35 fighter jets to Israel.

A number of relevant resouces have been produced regarding Israel’s war in the Middle East. Action on Armed Violence published a study examining Israel’s high-impact weaponry used in Gaza since 7 October 2023. An article written by by Jacques Hartmann, Lea Köhne, and Vincent Widdig summarises the domestic legal proceedings taking place in multiple countries regarding arms transfers to Israel (check out also the Arms Trade Litigation Monitor.) Human Rights Watch has launched a report about the use of incendiary weapons, which present cases studies of the Israeli military’s use of white phosphorous in Gaza and Lebanon since October 2023 (related to this, see news about Israel’s use of white phosphorus on UN peacekeepers in Lebanon.) Forensic Architecture has meticulously collected data and mapped Israel’s military conduct in Gaza since 7 October 2023 and published it under the project “A Cartography of Genocide.” The Costs of War Project at Brown University also published a recent report showing that US spending on military aid to Israel and military buildup in the Middle East in the last year has been at least 22.76 billion USD, with billions more in costs yet to come.

Gender and Disarmament Database: Recommendation of the month

Feminist Foreign Policy Fail? Assessing Canada’s Human Rights Obligations in Gaza,” is a submission to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) on the Occasion of the Committee's Review of Canada. The submission was jointly prepared by the International Human Rights Program (IHRP) at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law and the Global Human Rights Clinic (GHRC) at the University of Chicago Law School, and endorsed by more than 40 feminist, labour, faith-based, antiwar, and human rights organisations.

The Gender and Disarmament Database, created and maintained by Reaching Critical Will, features a wide range of resources such as reports, articles, books and book chapters, policy documents, podcasts, legislation, and UN documents. The database allows the exploration of relevant resources based on their references to distinctive gender aspects in disarmament, such as gender-based violence, gender norms, or gender diversity, and different related topics or types of weapon systems. It currently contains more than 800 resources. Suggestions of new additions can be sent to disarm[at]WILPF[dot]com. 

Upcoming events

Conferences

CCW Meeting of High Contracting Parties
13–15 November 2024 | Geneva, Switzerland 

Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction
18–22 November 2024 | New York, United States

Fifth Review Conference of the Mine Ban Treaty
25–29 November 2024 | Siem Reap, Cambodia 

9th Substantive Session of the Open-Ended Working Group on Information and Communication Technologies
2–6 December 2024 | New York, United States

Fifth session of the Working Group on the Strengthening of the Biological Weapons Convention and 2024 Meeting of States Parties 
2–13 and 16–18 December 2024 | Geneva, Switzerland

Events

Harms and Risks of AI in the Military
2–3 December 2024 | Quebec AI Institute, Montreal 

Featured news

Japanese organisation Nihon Hidankyo wins the Nobel Peace Prize

The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided to award the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize to the Japanese organisation Nihon Hidankyo. This grassroots movement of atomic bomb survivors from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, also known as Hibakusha, received the peace prize for “its efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again.”

Groups protest against White Mesa Uranium Mill 

On 12 October, a group of protesters marched in oposition to the White Mesa Mill, which is the last conventional uranium processing plant in operation in the United States. Organisers highlighted that there have been multiple studies showing the correlation between human exposure to uranium and health effects such as asthma. In one study published in January 2024, urine samples were taken from over 13,000 participants and the findings “confirmed the association between urinary U levels and the incidence of asthma in adults but also were the first to reveal that asthma prevalence in adolescents and children (<18 years) positively correlated with urinary U levels.”

UN expands Haiti arms embargo to all types of weapons

The UN Security Council has voted unanimously to expand its arms embargo in Haiti due to grave concerns over extremely high levels of gang violence. The embargo will extend to all types of arms and ammunition in the country. According to Robert Muggah, an expert interviewed by Al Jazeera, the biggest source of illegal firearms and ammunition is the United States. He explained that often the weapons from the US are purchased by “straw men”—people who buy from licensed dealers but conceal they are for someone else.

Worldwide use of explosive weapons in September resulted in 91 per cent of civilian casualties

The Explosive Weapons Monitor reported that at least one death or injury from the use of explosive weapons was recorded in 22 countries and territories in September 2024. According to the Monitor, worldwide there were at least 937 reported incidents of explosive weapons use resulting in 10,262 casualties, of which 9,371 (91 per cent) were civilians. About half of all reported civilian casualties occurred in Lebanon in September 2024. The Monitor reported that other affected countries and territories in terms of civilian casualties from the use of explosive weapons were Myanmar, the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Sudan, and Ukraine. There were 129 incidents of explosive weapon use affecting aid access, education and healthcare services.

The Explosive Weapons Monitor is a research initiative of the International Network of Explosive Weapons (INEW) that conducts research and analysis on harms from and practices of explosive weapon use and monitors the universalisation and implementation of the Political Declaration on Explosive Weapons in Populated Areas (EWIPA). Check out the Monitor’s new website, including the updated database on state positions. 

Most think thanks that testify before the US Congress are funded by weapon contractors

An investigation conducted by Responsible Statecraft found that about 80 per cent of witnesses who testify to US Congress on foreign policy related issues work for organisations that get money from weapon contractors. The investigation also found that they often hide these ties by saying they are testifying “on their own behalf,” thereby evading the requirement to disclose relevant financial relationships.

Silicon Valley celebrates election result in the US 

Accoding to Forbes, “the impending arrival of a second Trump administration has brought renewed excitement for Silicon Valley’s ambitions to make weapons and secure the large contracts needed to support them.” The piece notes that shares in Palantir, a weapons company, soared 8.61 per cent on Wednesday following the US election. Forbes also reports that “defense leaders” believe that with Elon Musk’s input, “Trump will upend and reallocate the $800 billion Department of Defense budget.” For more news on the topic, see the Automated Decision Research news monitoring.

How Big Tech has been liying about nuclear energy

Several news outlets reported that Microsoft is planning to reopen Three Mile Island nuclear plant to power its data centers, as well as that Google and Amazon also made announcements about using nuclear power for their energy needs. Following these news, a rencent article written by Kathryn Huff and Nathan Ryan analyses what will take to restart decommissioned US nuclear plants. Another piece written by M. V. Ramana highlights that while these Big Tech companies claim to be investing in nuclear energy to meet the needs of AI, the evidence suggests that their real motive is to greenwash themselves. “Their investments are small and completely inadequate with relation to how much is needed to build a reactor. But their investments are also very small compared to the bloated revenues of these corporations. So, from the viewpoint of top executives, investing in nuclear power must seem a cheap way to reduce bad publicity about their environmental footprints. Unfortunately, “cheap” for them does not translate to cheap for the rest of us, not to mention the burden to future generations of human beings from worsening climate change and, possibly, increased production of radioactive waste that will stay hazardous for hundreds of thousands of years,” noted Ramana.

Recommended resources

Podcast:Selling Guns, Exploiting Gender: Holding Firearm Manufacturers Accountable,” Mobilising Men for Feminist Peace, WILPF, November 2024.

Anna Nadibaidze, Ingvild Bode, and Qiaochu Zhang, “AI in Military Decision Support Systems,” Center for War Studies at the University of Southern Denmark, November 2024

Tilman Ruff, “Nuclear weapons and our climate,” ICAN Australia, November 2024

James Bamford, “Israel Is Killing Whole Families in Gaza—With Weapons Made in America,” The Nation, 21 October 2024

Podcast: Ahmed Alnaouq, Andrew Feinstein, and Anna Stavrianakis, “Western Complicity and the Human Cost of the Arms Trade in Gaza,” Radicals in Conversation podcast, 23 October 2024

PAX, “Making Drones Matter in the Disarmament Debate,” 21 October 2024

Barbara Morais Figueiredo and Katherine young, “Understanding Civilian Harm from the Indirect or Reverberating Effects of the Use of Explosive Weapons in Populated Areas: Strengthening Data Collection to Implement the Political Declaration,” UNIDIR, 15 October 2024 

Peter Herby and Tamar Gabelnick, “The Convention on Cluster Munitions under Pressure: States Parties’ Reaction to the Lithuanian Withdrawal,” Humanitarian Disarmament, 4 October 2024

Podcast: Ray Acheson and Bill Hartung, “The Arms Trade – Let’s Talk about Big Weapons,” Disrupting Peace, 1 October 2024 

Japan’s Ocean Dumping of Radioactive Waste Water: Threats to Women’s Human Rights in Pacific Island Countries,” Dawn Feminist and PANG, Shadow Report to the 89th Session of the CEDAW submitted to the Review of Japan, October 2024

Kaya Nadesan, “To rebuild what has been lost, we need decades: Reem Abbas," International Network on Explosive Weapons (INEW), October 2024