International Arms Trade
Currently in the world there are around 875 millions of conventional weapons being produced in 98 countries for more than 1.135 companies. It is estimated that on average more than 500.000 civilians die in a year, consequences of the use of weapons: a person per minute.
Problem
The weapons are one of the means to facilitate the perpetuation of many kinds of crimes and human right's violations, from crimes agaisn't the masses to crimes of gender like rape. The problem of the weapons doesn't restrict to areas of conflict. Studies show that two of three persons are killed with firearms in regions that are in peace.
Up to 2013, it didn't have a global treaty that regulates the international arms trade. Transference of weapons could be done freely to States or non-state actors that were involved in violations of the international humanitarian law and human rights. The absence of a wide regulation on conventional weapon's commercialization facilitates that they get into criminal hands.
Campaign
The Control Arms was created in 2003 with the objective of promoting and aid the creation of an international treaty about regulamentation of the arms trade. It was a coalition composed of 100 groups and organizations present in many countries.
The Control Arms led the global movement for the creation of the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), adopted in 2013, through advocacy, research, political analysis, international popular mobilization and media engagement, working with more than 300 partner organizations in all the regions of the world. One of the strategies of the campaign announcement was the slogan that in the world the trade of bananas was more regulated than the arms trade, attracting attention for the absence of control.
In 2011 was created the Control Arms Secretariat that began to represent the civil society sector in the diplomatic conferences about the theme. Today, the work concentrates in the universalization efforts of the ATT and the implementation of the established obligations.
Treaty
The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) was adopted in 2013 and entered into force in December, 2014. He regulates the international trade of conventional weapons, that is: battle tanks, armoured combat vehicles, large-calibre artillery systems, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, missiles and missiles launchers and small arms and light weapons.
The ATT prohibits the arms transfer to countries that have a substantial risk of being utilized for genocides, crimes against humanity, war crimes and grave human rights violations. Furthermore, the ATT predicts orientations for countries that are importer of arms and encourages the States party to cooperate in the sharing of necessary information to realizate the evaluation on the transference risk.
Therefore, the ATT introduces a responsibility notion to States about their international arms transference, in the intent to avoid that weapons fall in the wrong hands or that are diverted to the black Market. See here the States party of the ATT.
and brazil?
Brazil is a State party of the Arms Trade Treaty since 2018, after ratification in September, 2018. The Brazilian position in the ATT is based on defense and responsible control of the international transference of arms, with the objective of avoiding that these weapons be utilized for violations in human rights, war crimes or terrorism. In international forums, Brazil usually reinforces the importance of transparency, international cooperation and the effective implementation of the treaty obligations for all States Parties, including through the mechanism of technical aid and training for countries with lesser institutional capacity.
Despite the adhesion to the treaty, Brazil also expresses concerns about the possibility of unbalances in the application of the ATT, specially when utilizing criteria that may negatively affect the arms industry. The country defends the necessity to preserve the legit right of self defense and also to manufacture and export arms according to the United Nations Charter. Internally, Brazil faces challenges in relation to the transparency of exports and the control about the final destination of sold armaments, principally considering the complaints about use of Brazilian weapons in context of repression and violence in Latin American countries.