In East Timor, mobs of rogue militiamen recently killed hundreds of innocent people. In Kosovo, thousands of civilians were caught in the crossfire of combatants. And in Colombia, guerrillas armed to the teeth are threatening the safety of politicians and human rights activists. These are just three of the many hot spots all over the world which share a deadly problem_the uncontrolled spread of small arms. But the international community is working together to fight the danger. The United Nations has developed innovative programmes in the context of peacekeeping and peace-building to help curb the spread of small arms.

The availability of hundreds of millions of small arms worldwide has contributed to a sharp increase in violent crime and internal conflicts and has given rise to mounting concern by Governments and civil society. Inexpensive to purchase, available in abundance and requiring little training, they were the weapon of choice in 46 of the 49 major conflicts since 1990.

According to a panel of 27 international experts convened by Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 1996, more than 500 million small arms and light weapons are in circulation around the world_that is about 1 for every 12 people. "In the last decade, 4 million deaths were caused by light weapons", Jayantha Dhanapala, Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament, told the UN Chronicle, and about 90 per cent were civilians and 80 per cent were women and children.

While UN Member States have adopted a number of agreements to prevent the development and proliferation of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, no global treaty or worldwide monitoring system exists yet to curb the destabilizing accumulation and misuse of small arms. They are acquired through legal as well as illegal channels. According to an August 1999 United Nations report on small arms, they include those left over from the cold war, especially in developing countries: an estimated 2 million in Central America, 7 million in West Africa and 10 million in Afghanistan.

Protracted armed confrontations in developing countries have destroyed years of progress in infrastructure-building and the promotion of economic development. The United Nations Humanitarian Affairs Office estimates that firearms in Latin America have cost 14 per cent of the gross national product in terms of health and damage to person and property. In Mali, UNDP and the Government launched a large-scale programme where about 13,000 ex-combatants exchanged their weapons for the possibility of reinserting themselves into civilian life. In September, representatives and experts from more than 20 African countries agreed that an Internet-accessible register should contain information concerning import, export, manufacture, seizure and military arms holdings of light weapons. Ghana's Minister of Defense, Lt. Col. E. K. T. Donkoh, himself a former soldier, lauded the initiative: "This project will contribute to the removal of threats to the stability of the region and create an enabling environment for economic growth."

And yet, the battle will not be easy because small arms do not have the stigma landmines do, since many Governments believe that small arms can serve important purposes. On 24 September, the Security Council reviewed the issue at a ministerial level. "Most of the conflicts had taken place in the developing world, but most of the firearms were made in the industrial world", said Robin Cook, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs of the United Kingdom. Datuk Seri Syed Hamid Albar, Foreign Minister of Malaysia, said that the flow of small arms, particularly to developing countries, was driven not only by forces of demand but also of supply. United Sates Secretary of State Madeleine Albright noted that the economy of war, which supported illicit arms flows, also needed to be attacked. And Martin Andjaba, Permanent Representative of Namibia, observed that merchants of war, motivated by the prospect of fortune, felt neither urgency to curb transfers nor concern about the devastating consequences that small arms had on developing countries.

The International Action Network on Small Arms set up headquarters in London in October to urge Governments to adopt greater restrictions on the small arms they approve for export, suppress illicit transfers and try to extract weapons already in circulation around the globe through buy-back programmes and other incentives.

How best to tackle the destabilizing accumulation of small arms and light weapons internationally will also be discussed at a conference to be convened in Switzerland by 2001. The Preparatory Committee held its first session from 28 February to 3 March 2000 in New York. Since 1997, a number of global and regional initiatives on small arms have emerged. These include: a moratorium on the Importation, Exportation and Manufacture of Small Arms and Light Weapons in West Africa by the Economic Community of West African States; the Inter-American Convention against the Illicit Manufacturing and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives and Other Related Materials; the European Union Joint Action on Small Arms; the July 1999 Decision on the Proliferation, Circulation and Illicit Trafficking of Small Arms and Light Weapons taken by the heads of State and Government of the Organization of African Unity; and the August 1999 Decisions of the Council of the Southern African Development Community on the Prevention and Combating of Illicit Trafficking in Small Arms and Related Crimes.

Negotiations are also under way in Vienna to elaborate an international convention against transnational crime, including a revised draft protocol against the illicit manufacturing of and trafficking in firearms, ammunition and other related materials.

Seduction and Induction Some 300,000 youths under the age of 16 are estimated to have been exploited as participants in conflicts using small arms. By 1998, as many as 200,000 children had been given a gun to fight alongside adults as irregular soldiers in 25 countries. The United Nations Children's Fund and other relevant organizations have been asked to focus on the special needs of affected children in post-conflict situations. Olara Otunnu, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, stresses: "Words on paper could not save children and women in peril." He states that in order to stem the present massive use of children as soldiers, a three-pronged approach is needed: first, the age limit for recruitment and participation in armed conflict should be raised from the present 15 to 18; second, an effective movement of international pressure must be mobilized to lean on armed groups that were abusing children; and third, the political, social and economic factors, which created an environment where children were induced by appeal of ideology or by socio-economic collapse to become child soldiers, must be addressed.