COMITÉ INTERNATIONAL DE LA CROIX-ROUGE

Arms Transfers, Humanitarian Assistance and International Humanitarian Law

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has witnessed in its work for war victims throughout the world the increasingly devastating effects for civilian populations of the proliferation of weapons, particularly small arms. The combination of inadequate controls on the transfer of arms and their frequent use in violation of the basic norms of international humanitarian law (IHL) threatens to undermine international legal norms intended to protect civilians from suffering and abuse in combat situations.

Civilian populations have paid an appalling price for the widespread availability of arms and ammunition in recent conflicts:

• Civilian casualties outnumber those of combatants in many internal and ethnic conflicts and have increased throughout the century in parallel with the development of new military technologies;
• Disease, starvation and abuse increase when humanitarian agencies including the ICRC are directly attacked and must suspend operations or leave a country; and
• Suffering continues, often for years after the end of conflicts, as the availability of arms engenders a "culture of violence," undermines the rule of law and threatens efforts at reconciliation among former warring parties.

Weapons available to a wide variety of actors in conflict and post-conflict situations now include highly destructive and lethal instruments previously available primarily to organized armed forces. These include automatic rifles capable of firing hundreds of rounds per minute, rocket propelled grenades, mortars and landmines. Whereas previously a single shot fired into a crowded market would have constituted an isolated criminal incident, the firing of several hundred bullets from the automatic weapons now readily available can unleash an orgy of ethnic killings and civil unrest.

The ICRC is gravely concerned that efforts to teach respect for the norms of international humanitarian law are being undermined by the flow of weapons.

Given the situation described above the ICRC makes the following observations and suggestions, based on its field experience and mandate as guardian of international humanitarian law:

• The unregulated transfer of weapons and ammunition can increase tensions, heighten civilian casualties and prolong the duration of conflicts.
• The current pattern of small arms transfers, because it is largely outside of international control, is a matter of urgent concern.
• While the primary responsibility for compliance with international humanitarian law falls upon users of arms, States and enterprises engaged in production and export bear some responsibility to the international community for the use made of their weapons and ammunition.
• Although States have an undisputed right under international law to retain armaments required for their security, they also have an equally solemn moral and legal responsibility, under Article 1 common to the Geneva Conventions of 1949, to "respect and ensure respect" for international humanitarian law. The transfer of arms and ammunition should be examined in this light. States should, in particular, consider whether arms and ammunition can be viewed as simply another form of commercial goods.
• Given the serious threat to international humanitarian law, to international peace and security and to the social fabric of societies which the unregulated spread and undisciplined use of weapons presents, the ICRC encourages States urgently to consider the elaboration of rules, based on humanitarian law and other criteria, governing the transfer of arms and ammunition.

The international community has in recent decades enacted important prohibitions and limitations on the transfer of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, missile systems and components of these technologies. Certain geographical regions have established controls on the transfer of major conventional weapon systems. However until recently little attention has been given to the transfer of small arms which have inflicted most of the death and injury in recent conflicts. The ICRC encourages governments, regional organizations and NG0s involved in the development of arms transfer limitations to recognize that international humanitarian law is often the body of law most relevant to the stated purpose for which military arms and ammunition are transferred. Criteria based on IHL considerations should be an important element of any new limitations developed in the coming years.

The ICRC was commissioned in 1995 by the 26th International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent to examine, on the basis of its first-hand experience, the extent to which the availability ofweapons contributes to violations of international humanitarian law and the deterioration of the situation of civilians. The ICRC will submit this study, which may include further specific recommendations for IHL-based controls on arms availability, to the 27th International Conference in 1999.

As part of the preparation of the above study the ICRC will convene a meeting of international experts on arms transfers, in cooperation with the Norwegian Red Cross, in Oslo in May 1998. The ICRC report, to be published by the end of 1998, as well as that of the Oslo expert group meeting, will also assist in clarifying the views of various components of the International Movement of the Red Cross and Red Crescent on this subject, pending a decision by the 1999 Council of Delegates on the position
and role of the Movement as a whole.

International Committee of the Red Cross
19 February 1998