The United Nations - Background
At the end of World War Two, fifty-one countries joined together to form the United Nations (UN) in an effort to ensure that such a war would never occur again. The UN maintains a collective desire for a better world and the greater good of humanity through the promotion of peace and harmony.
The UN has six component
parts:
1) The General Assembly
is where all members are represented. This is where all major discussions are
held and decisions made;
2) The Security Council
is responsible for the advancement of world peace and the enforcement of peacekeeping;
3) The Economic and
Social Council is responsible for human rights and for promoting a better way
of life for all peoples;
4) The International
Court of Justice is responsible for international legal issues;
5) The Trusteeship
Council assists small regions which were not self-governing when the UN was
established;
6) The Secretariat
assists all UN bodies to carry out their responsibilities.
A view of unopened
crates of assault rifles in a Third World security force armoury.
Not equipped with alarms, it was subsequently robbed.
One part of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) is the Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice. It is these two bodies that are in the process of affecting the rights of sporting shooters. At the Vienna meeting of the latter body, held from April 28th to May 9th, 1997, Australia was represented by observers Mr Chris Meaney, Head of Delegation, and also Mr Daryl Smeaton, about whom more is said on page seven of this document.
The UN has established a reputation for providing food to starving millions, keeping the peace in countries torn by civil war and reducing the worldwide nuclear weapons stockpile through its "general and complete disarmament" program.
Over time the UN turned its attention towards the banning of biological and chemical weapons and also of landmines which remain a major hazard to civilians in warring countries long after hostilities cease.
More recently, after then Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali spoke in 1995 of the world being "awash with small arms", (1) the UN "has turned its attention to a class of armament that is killing more people than major weapons - namely small, civilian-owned firearms. Such arms are increasingly associated with accidents, suicides and crime". (2)
While this statement may hold good for some countries, it is demonstrably untrue for Australia. Nevertheless, the UN began to press ahead with a related program of "conventional disarmament".
This was initially directed towards "small arms" or "light weapons" being used in civil strife experienced in mainly Third World countries.
However, over time it was extended much further, to encompass the civilian ownership of firearms.
The Commission On Crime Prevention And Criminal Justice is examining national and transnational economic and organised crime, crime prevention strategies and, in particular, crimes in urban areas and violent criminality.
Recently, there have been disturbing worldwide surges in urban crime and violence, prolific drug abuse, ethnic and racial tensions and the general breakdown of social and family values being experienced in western nations.
In an attempt to deal with these problems, conventional disarmament has come to include "micro-disarmament" with an ever-expanding net. The Australian Government has not made public the depth of its involvement in this area.
What is important to us here and now is that the Council and Commission are currently concerning themselves with "light weapons transfers". This originally meant all forms of movement of illegal light weapons both within countries and internationally, but now it has come to include the worldwide regulation of legally owned civilian firearms.
Categories receiving special international attention at the moment and indicated for a worldwide ban include "military-style" semi-automatic rifles and handguns. We all know what has happened to the first group in Australia and the second group in Great Britain. But other groups of firearms are likely to be singled out in the future, and include remaining shotguns and centrefire and rimfire rifles. Meanwhile, the threat against all handguns in Australia is obvious.
The UN is not alone in acting upon concerns about the proliferation of small arms. The British American Security Information Council (BASIC) coordinates international work in the areas of improving domestic gun control, eliminating or restricting certain types of weapons and developing global regimes to eliminate black market sales of firearms. BASIC lists no fewer than forty organisations worldwide which have an interest in restricting what it refers to as "light weapons transfers". (3)
Today the complex nature of world affairs is such that no one issue can be resolved without taking into account other implications which may disrupt attempts to develop international ties. One nation's need or desire to trade with another may well sway decisions made at the UN with scant regard to the wishes of the people in the countries concerned. This globalisation of world economies is clearly affecting the sovereignty of all countries worldwide.
Japan, because of its own internal domestic concerns, has been a prime mover contributing large funding towards the cause of micro-disarmament. Japan's economic muscle may be a strong motivating factor for other countries to support Japanese initiatives brought before the United Nations.
Australia, in seeking a significant role on the world stage, has played no small part through promoting the flawed National Committee on Violence Report to the UN as a theoretical basis for the microdisarmament process. The Australian people need to be asking very pointed questions about why we are not being told the facts, and to what extent the UN approach is appropriate for our country.
UN efforts to prevent and contain civil and transnational armed conflict, violence and crime have either been inadvertently, strategically or deliberately linked to millions of those sportsmen and women worldwide who use their firearms in recreational activities.
The UN has spent over fifty years in the pursuit of a war-free world through such programs as the international disarmament of military hardware. "General and complete disarmament" has become "conventional disarmament" and now "microdisarmament" which is soon to become a catch-all for every firearm in the civilian realm, both illegal and legal.
Australian civilian firearm owners have now been caught up in a net that has been cast far too wide.
Sport shooting in Australia is about to go the way of the British handgun enthusiast whose activities now face a total ban by big government.
We are tired of unwarranted interference. The time has come for Australian sporting shooters to tell political leaders at both federal and state levels that enough is enough.
1. United Nations Information Service "Commission On Crime Prevention and Criminal
Justice to Hold Fifth Session in Vienna, 12-31 May to Consider Global Action
on Organised Crime, Money Laundering, Violence against Women, Extradition, Terrorist
Acts, Firearms Regulation, Victims' Concerns" 20 May, UNIS/CP/319, 1996, p7.
2. Ibid.
3. British American Security Information Council, "Current Projects on Light Weapons - Project on Light Weapons Working Paper No 1", London/Washington, Feb. 1996.
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