Statements by RCW
WILPF Statement on the adoption of the 2017 Universal Periodic Review of the United Kingdom in regards to its arms transfers to Saudi Arabia
The following statement was submitted by WILPF during the adoption of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of the United Kingdom during the Human Rights Council's 36th session (11 to 29 September 2017). WILPF welcomes the United Kingdom’s (UK) acceptance of recommendation 132.134: “In the context of the defence of the right to life, carefully assess the transfer of arms to those countries where they are likely to be used for human rights abuses and violations (Peru)”. Such acceptance is consistent with the UK’s obligations as a state party to the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), particularly under articles 6 and 7, and as a state party to human rights treaties, such as the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). It is also consistent with the UK’s obligations under the EU Common Position on Arms Exports and the UK’s own Consolidated Licensing Criteria on arms exports. These are...
WILPF Statement to the Third Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty
This statement was delivered by Ms. Ray Acheson, Director of WILPF's disarmament programme Reaching Critical Will, to the Third Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty on 12 September 2017 in Geneva, Switzerland. Download in PDF Yemen. Syria. Iraq. South Sudan. Ukraine. One only needs to look at news reports on these countries to understand that civilians are dying and cities are being destroyed. The statistics of the dead and the displaced, however, do not account for the personal horror experienced by each individual trapped in these war zones, watching their loved ones and their cities die. The statistics also do not necessarily account for the experiences of women or girls during and after armed conflict, which usually include vastly increased rates of sexual violence, trafficking, forced marriage, abuse, and harassment. Many—and sometimes most—of the weapons being used in these conflicts have been made and sold by ATT states parties and signatories. In...
Download PDF
WILPF Statement to the CEDAW Committee's 67th session's review of Italy, regarding its arms exports
At the 67th Session of the of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), WILPF International and WILPF Italy delivered the following oral statement during the Committee’s meeting with NGOs. Thank you Madam Chair, Our submission is about the impact of Italy’s arms transfers on the rights and safety of women in importing countries. It provides some examples of transfers that undermine Italy’s international legal obligations, including under CEDAW. These are transfers to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, countries that have been involved in the conflict in Yemen. Italy is a party to the Arms Trade Treaty. In spite of what is required by the Treaty and the EU Code of Conduct on Arms Exports, Italy has not established a specific mechanism to prevent arms sales from having an impact on gender-based violence in the recipient countries. There are also issues with the transparency of the information provided in the governments’ annual...
WILPF Statement to the UN conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, on the treaty's prohibitions
The following is WILPF's statement to the UN conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, on the treaty's general obligations, delivered on 18 June 2017. Thank you Madame President, We appreciate the new draft text, which is a good basis for further work. In regards to the general obligations, we would support the addition of a prohibition on planning and preparations to use nuclear weapons, and of language explicitly stating that transit of nuclear weapons is not permitted by states parties. These provisions would cover some of the most vital activities that are currently involved in the operation of nuclear “deterrence”. Before the lunch break the ICRC made the case for including planning and preparatios for use of nuclear weapons, so I won’t repeat that here, but strongly support their intervention. On the subject of transit, establishing that states parties must not permit the transit of nuclear weapons through their territorial waters,...
WILPF Statement to the UN conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, on the treaty's general obligations
The following is WILPF's statement to the UN conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, on the treaty's general obligations, delivered on 19 June 2017. Thank you Madame President, The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, which is a partner of ICAN, believes that the prohibitions of this treaty should be clear and comprehensive, and should be focused on affecting current nuclear weapon policies and practices. Among other things, this means maintaining the prohibition on testing. Prohibiting testing in the ban treaty would reinforce and strengthen the norm against nuclear weapon testing. It will also help to strengthen efforts for maintaining the funding and legal authority for the CTBTO’s verification regime. On the other hand, omitting testing from the prohibited activities in the ban treaty could leave a crucial gap in the treaty’s core prohibitions that will be necessary for preventing future development or reconstitution of...
WILPF Statement to the Human Rights Council: Human rights must come before profits from the arms trade
Statement made by WILPF at the UN Human Rights Council 35th session (6 to 23 June 2017) during General Debate under items 2 and 3[1]. WILPF has been consistently drawing attention to human rights violations connected to arms transfers. We therefore welcome the increasing attention that the Council has been giving to this issue. Action by human rights bodies adds an extra layer of accountability beyond the Arms Trade Treaty and reinforces that human rights concerns must come ahead of profit in the arms trade. We particularly welcome the High Commissioner’s report on the “Impact of arms transfers on the enjoyment of human rights”,[2] which reviews relevant international and regional legal frameworks, including guidance that exists on this subject from different human rights mechanisms. In this report, the UN High Commissioner highlights the many ways in which arms, and the arms trade, contribute to gender-based violence. It is very clear in outlining the role that the Committee on...
WILPF Statement on the oral update of the Commission of Inquiry on Syria, regarding weapons transfers to Syria and their impact on women
WILPF delivered the below statement on the margins of the 35th session of the Human Rights Council, during an interactive dialogue with the Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic. Click here to watch the video. The conflict in Syria has witnessed intense use of explosive weapons in highly populated areas by warring parties and their international allies. This practice has not yet been faced with this Council’s scrutiny despite causing huge civilian death, destruction of infrastructure and displacement, all with distinct, severe and disproportionate impact on women. Women affected by explosive violence often have fewer opportunities to access health care services and reconstruction processes. When heading the household, as women often do during armed conflict, they face systematic discrimination in trying to provide for their families. They also become more susceptible to further physical attack and sexual exploitation, especially when displaced from their homes. The...
WILPF Statement to the Human Rights Council on the need for continued scrutiny of the gendered impacts of arms proliferation
The following is WILPF's submission to the UN Human Rights Council 35th session (6 to 23 June 2017), Clustered interactive dialogue with: Independent Expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity and Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions. The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) welcomes the reports of the Independent Expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity and the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.[1] Mr. Muntarbhorn, the presentation of your first report to the Human Rights Council is an historic moment in the United Nations’ commitment towards protecting and promoting the universality of human rights. We urge all states to take the opportunity offered by your mandate and your approach of open and constructive dialogue to identify effective ways to prevent violence and...
WILPF Statement on the USA's arms transfers to countries where child soldiers are used
This statement is WILPF's submission to the Committee on the Rights of the Child on its review of the USA’s combined Third and Fourth Periodic Report submitted under article 8 (1) of the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict, made in May 2017.
Arms transfers have a well-documented and multi-faceted impact on human rights. They facilitate the movement of the very same weapons – or ammunition – that are used to curtail human rights in direct and specific ways by militaries, paramilitaries, law enforcement groups, criminals and gangs. This impact includes, but is not limited to the recruitment of children and their use in hostilities.
Experts have long recognized the strong link between child soldiers and arms transfers, particularly small arms and light weapons. In 2008, the Special Representative of the Secretary General (SRSG) on Children and Armed Conflict, stated that “it is argued by many that it is...
WILPF statement to the 2017 NPT Preparatory Committee
This statement was delivered by Ms. Ray Acheson, Director of WILPF's disarmament programme Reaching Critical Will, to the 2017 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Preparatory Committee in Vienna, Austria on 3 May 2017. All of the nuclear-armed states—including those that are states parties to the NPT—are investing in the expansion, development, or so-called modernisation of their nuclear arsenals. These programmes are not just about “increasing the safety and security” of nuclear weapon systems, which is what the nuclear-armed states claim. The “upgrades” in many cases provide new capabilities to the weapon systems. They also extend the lives of these weapon systems beyond the middle of this century, ensuring that the arms race will continue indefinitely. China is transitioning from liquid-fueled slow-launching missiles to solid-fuel, quicker-launching road-mobile missiles, to make the force more “useable”. Recently China has also sped up the modernisation of its sea-based strategic...
Download PDF
WILPF statement to the UN conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading to their elimination
Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF)
Statement to the UN conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading to their elimination, Topic 2
Delivered by Ray Acheson, Director of Reaching Critical Will
29 March 2017
Thank you Madame/Mr. President,
Thank you for this opportunity to address this conference. WILPF has prepared a paper on principles, prohibitions, and positive obligations of a treaty banning nuclear weapons. After listening closely to interventions from delegations this morning, I would like to comment on a few of the prohibitions and positive obligations.
Prohibitions
In order to be effective as a prohibition treaty that leads to the elimination of nuclear weapons, the core prohibitions the treaty should be as clear and comprehensive as possible. It should draw upon other treaties prohibiting weapons but also needs to be mindful of the existing rules governing nuclear weapons, as well as specific...
Download PDF
WILPF statement on multidimensional insecurity and its impacts on Libyan women
The following statement was submitted by WILPF to the 34th session of the UN Human Rights Council (27 February to 24 March) under Item 10: Technical assistance and capacity-building, Interactive dialogue on the situation of human rights in Libya. إضغط هنا لقراءة البيان الخطي باللغة العربية After the 2011 NATO military operation to remove Qadhafi from power, there was a brief moment of hope for a new, inclusive and democratic country. Libya has, however, not only been rendered internally chaotic and dysfunctional, it has become: a target of extended aerial bombardment by the United States,[1] Egypt,[2] and possibly France[3]; a site of Islamic extremism and home to an apparent offshoot of Daesh (ISIS); a corridor for people traffickers, and a destination for desperate refugees and migrants attempting to flee to Europe;[4] and a source of weapons flows that have destabilised fragile internal truces, Libya’s neighbours and the region.[5] The use of explosive weapons in populated...
WILPF statement to UN member states on the Commission on the Status of Women and the US government's travel ban
The Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) is the principal global intergovernmental body exclusively dedicated to the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women. A declared principle, made during its first session in 1947, is: “to raise the status of women, irrespective of nationality, race, language or religion, to equality with men in all fields of human enterprise, and to eliminate all discrimination against women in the provisions of statutory law, in legal maxims or rules, or in interpretation of customary law.” Each year WILPF brings women from all over the world to participate in the annual session in New York. In so doing, we strengthen the multilateral system and assist in upholding the Charter of the UN itself. The Charter recognises the significant role played by civil society in the work of the UN by making provision for formal participation of NGOs in UN processes. On 27 January 2017, the US President issued an executive order banning all entry to the...
WILPF statement: Aleppo is bidding humanity goodbye
14 December 2016 (Read this statement in Arabic) If you are active on Twitter or Facebook and follow global news, this is probably not the first text you have read on what is currently happening in Aleppo. But if it is, then brace yourself for the worst before reading what follows. The northern Syrian city of Aleppo has been a key battleground in the conflict between the warring factions in Syria for the past four years. However, the latest developments since July 2016 have prompted a series of consecutive turning points in the city’s modern history, leading to its catastrophic destruction this week. Since the Syrian dictator and his foreign allies, including Russia and Iran, firmly encircled the eastern part of the city last September, Aleppo has been witnessing the most relentless, indiscriminate aerial bombardment since the peaceful revolution metastasised into a bloody conflict. Local sources and international reports have drawn out a systematic pattern of explosive weapon...
WILPF statement to the Fifth CCW Review Conference
The following statement was delivered by Ray Acheson, Director of Reaching Critical Will programme of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, at the Fifth Review Conference of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) in Geneva on 12 December 2016. As we gather here in Geneva, we are witness to the destruction of entire cities, communities, and societies elsewhere. The worst example of this right now is Aleppo. This city has seen the relentless use of explosive weapons in populated areas, leading to the destruction of hospitals and homes. Prohibited or restricted weapons such as incendiary weapons, chemical weapons, and cluster munitions have been used. No humanitarian aid has reached the area since July 2016. There are about 275,000 civilians besieged in eastern Aleppo, including 100,000 children. Leaflets warning civilians that they will be annihilated if they stay are being dropped and there is widespread concern about the impact of potentially 200,000...
Download PDF
WILPF statement on the report of the Commission of Inquiry on Syria
WILPF welcomes the Commission of Inquiry’s continued efforts to highlight the grave human rights situation in Syria but remains concerned about the Syrian government’s persistent denial of access into its territory. We greatly recognise the integration of some gendered analysis into the Commission’s report to shed the light on the severe and disproportionate impact of the conflict on women. WILPF has detailed this impact in a joint submission with Syrian women’s grassroots organisations for the UPR of Syria.[1] We strongly encourage the Commission to develop the gendered analysis and integrate it in all its future reports, including to reflect how the armed conflict undermines women’s social, political and economic participation in a society already suffering from discrimination, patriarchy and gender-based violence. We remain particularly alarmed by the pattern of systematic and deliberate attacks on civilian infrastructure, especially medical facilities and personnel. Mr....
WILPF statement on the use of weapons and arms transfers to parties in the conflict in Yemen
WILPF has been following the situation in Yemen with great concern. As the High Commissioner states in his report on Yemen to this Council session,[1] the situation has deteriorated significantly in the past year. Eighty per cent of the population is in urgent need of humanitarian assistance[2] and more than 2.5 million people have been displaced.[3] In such context, women and girls often suffer gravely and disproportionately due to forced displacement, sexual violence, trafficking, lack of access to health care, including sexual and reproductive health, and to victim and survivor assistance.[4] Hospitals, schools, markets, and houses have been targeted by explosive weapons. The large destructive radius of such weapons means that even the striking of military targets within a populated area has caused the destruction or damaging of civilian infrastructure, such as health and education facilities and houses.[5] Cluster munitions, which were banned in 2008 by a widely...
WILPF Statement to the Second Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty, Treaty Implementation
As peace talks over the conflict in Yemen collapsed, Saudi Arabia unleashed a new wave of shocking and unacceptable bombing raids in populated areas in Yemen, destroying hospitals, schools, markets, and homes. This has been going on for a year and a half. Several UN bodies have described the bombing as in violation of international humanitarian law and human rights law. Médecins Sans Frontières and the International Committee of Red Cross have had to start a campaign, Not A Target, to explain that hospitals must not be attacked during war. Yet several ATT states parties and signatories continue to transfer arms to Saudi Arabia. Campaign Against Arms Trade found that by April 2016 the UK government had issued 122 licences for military exports to Saudi Arabia since it began its military intervention in Yemen, signing off on £3.3 billion of arms exports in the first year of the war. In June 2015, after the intervention began, France signed deals with Saudi Arabia worth $12 billion,...
Download PDF
WILPF Statement to the Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty, General Debate
23 August 2016 The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom welcomes the opportunity to address the Second Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty. We participated in the negotiation of the Treaty as a feminist peace organisation advocating for a Treaty that would prevent humanitarian harm and confront the global culture of violence, including the access and use of weapons by young men and the reinforcement of violent masculinities. Since then, we have maintained that this is the most important guiding principle for states’ implementation efforts. Thus we hope that this meeting provides states, international organisations, and civil society with the opportunity to address challenges in the Treaty’s implementation, establish comprehensive and transparent reporting procedures for the arms trade, and above all challenge those that profit from war and violence instead of preventing humanitarian harm. There is much work to be done at CSP2, and decisions around...
Download PDF
WILPF Statement to the Second Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty, General Debate
23 August 2016 The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom welcomes the opportunity to address the Second Conference of States Parties to the Arms Trade Treaty. We participated in the negotiation of the Treaty as a feminist peace organisation advocating for a Treaty that would prevent humanitarian harm and confront the global culture of violence, including the access and use of weapons by young men and the reinforcement of violent masculinities. Since then, we have maintained that this is the most important guiding principle for states’ implementation efforts. Thus we hope that this meeting provides states, international organisations, and civil society with the opportunity to address challenges in the Treaty’s implementation, establish comprehensive and transparent reporting procedures for the arms trade, and above all challenge those that profit from war and violence instead of preventing humanitarian harm. There is much work to be done at CSP2, and decisions around...
Download PDF
WILPF Statement to the May 2016 session of the open-ended working group on nuclear disarmament
9 May 2016 Thank you Chairperson, I’m speaking on behalf of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, which is a partner organisation of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN). We have heard some excellent interventions today discussing potential elements for a legally binding prohibition on nuclear weapons. Together with Article 36, we submitted a working paper to this OEWG, NGO/3, which is based on a report we prepared in 2014. It looks at possible principles, elements, effects, and processes for banning nuclear weapons. I’d like to draw on that working paper in responding to some of the comments made by states here today. Comprehensive prohibitions Several delegations have emphasised the importance of prohibiting not just use of nuclear weapons but their possession and all relevant nuclear weapon related activities. In our conception of such an instrument, a ban treaty should prohibit the use, development, production, stockpiling, transfer,...
Download PDF
WILPF Statement to the 2016 CCW meeting of experts on lethal autonomous weapon systems
This statement was delivered by Ray Acheson, Director of Reaching Critical Will at the 2016 CCW meeting of experts on lethal autonomous weapon systems in Geneva on 12 April 2016. The PDF is available for download. Writing in the mid-20th century, the philosopher Simone Weil called for the examination of technology and means of warfare rather than just the ends pursued by war. She argued that to understand the consequences of war, we need to analyse the social relations that are implied by our instruments of violence. With these discussions at the UN on lethal autonomous weapon systems, we have the opportunity to ask questions about this technology before it is fully developed or deployed. We know that research and development is ongoing. We have seen some precursors tested and used. But we still have the chance to interrogate—and prevent—the consequences of fully mechanising our means of violence and war. Two aspects of Weil’s approach are relevant for our discussions about...
Download PDF
WILPF Statement to the CCW Meeting of High Contracting Parties
We meet again in Geneva as civilians are dying around the world from the use of conventional weapons. Civilian deaths and injuries from the use of explosive weapons in populated areas have gone up for the third year in a row. Prohibited weapons such as cluster munitions have been used in recent conflicts. Explosive remnants of war continue to kill civilians long after conflicts have ended. Meanwhile, profits continue to soar from the design, manufacture, and sale of ever more weapons. The bombs and other explosive weapons killing civilians in armed conflicts around the world should be controlled by international law and moral conscience. Instead, they are sold for profit to those who use them for political gain. Those selling the weapons are complicit in the deaths of civilians; the destruction of their villages, towns, and cities; and the mass displacement that follows. There seems to be a sense of entitlement from some countries to produce, use, and sell weapons as they wish....
Download PDF
Statement on gender and disarmament to the UN General Assembly First Committee
On 16 October 2015, Reaching Critical Will's Director Ray Acheson delivered the following statement to the UN General Assembly First Committee on Disarmament and International Security. The statement was endorsed by a large number of civil society organisations, listed at the end. The negative impacts on our society of patriarchy and male privilege are perhaps nowhere more pervasive and pernicious than in the field of weapons, war, and militarism. By consequence, much of the discussion on disarmament perpetuates the highly problematic gender constructions of men who are violent and powerful and women that are vulnerable and need to be protected. Gender perspectives in disarmament, peace, and security must be about exposing and challenging this state of affairs, not about including more women in the existing systems of structural inequalities and violent masculinities. Earlier this week, the UN Security Council convened an open debate for the fifteenth anniversary of resolution...
Statement to the UN commemoration of the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons
30 September 2015, New York Delivered by Ray Acheson of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom on behalf of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) Last month marked the 70th anniversary of the US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The hibakusha, the survivors of these bombings, demand nuclear abolition. So do the victims and survivors of the 2000 nuclear tests around the world, who have had their lives changed forever and over generations. This call is supported by the majority of the world’s governments and peoples. Yet the states that wield nuclear weapons continue to do so, just as they continue to pour billions of dollars into the maintenance and modernisation of these weapons of terror. These states protest that the reemerging humanitarian and moral discourse and approach to nuclear weapons is a distraction from what they see as the real work of disarmament—yet they refuse to engage in disarmament negotiations themselves. This...
Download PDF