Subject: Wendy Cukier writes on the United Nations Agenda, Bowmac -
Linda and Mark
Date: Thu, 07 Jun 2001 14:32:32 -0400
From: CILA / ICAL National Office <[email protected]>
To: (Recipient list suppressed)
CILA / ICAL
Defending Canada's Heritage
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Wendy Cukier writes on the United Nations Agenda
This is an intercepted, confidential e-mail from Wendy Cukier to IANSA
(The
International Action Network on Small Arms) regarding the United Nations
Small
Arms Summit taking place in July.
------------------------
From: "Philip Alpers"
Reply-To: "iansa-strategy"
To: "iansa-strategy"
Subject: [iansa-strategy] Larger List of NGOs?
Date: Sat, 2 Jun 2001 10:16:10 +1200
Lu, thanks a heap for the summary of groups attending -- this should
make it
clear how seriously the opposition's army intends to take the July
conference.
Is a copy of the full list of applicants for accreditation available?
It
would help in contacting like-minded groups with a view to organising
shared-interest blocs for the main event.
It would also be helpful if we were told how many individual passes
the gun
lobby will have at its disposal. They're fielding 14 pro-gun NGOs,
but how
many roving attendees?
Does IANSA have a written policy to cover attendance at IANSA-sponsored
meetings during the conference? Will IANSA have its own, dedicated
meeting
room, or will this be allocated by the UN for the use of all NGOs?
If the
latter, I'm sure the gun lobby will insist on seeding IANSA meetings
with
their own attendees.
Have you successfully excluded groups from IANSA membership whose aims
are
opposed to your own? If gun lobby groups are allowed to become members,
their people will surely attend meetings even if the room is reserved
exclusively
for IANSA. Delegates to governmental delegations are unlikely to be
candid when
briefing IANSA members if gun lobbyists are also present.
Thanks,
PA
Philip Alpers
Gun policy researcher
PO Box 90-227
Auckland 1030 New Zealand
Ph: +64 (9) 376-3999
Fax: +64 (9) 376-4212
E-mail: [email protected]
------------------------
From: Wendy Cukier
Reply-To: "iansa-strategy"
To: "iansa-strategy"
Subject: [iansa-strategy] Re: A couple of strategy questions
Date: Wed, 6 Jun 2001 08:35:26 -0400
RE any strategy.
I think suggestions that the NRA will come on side if issues related
to
civilian possession are dropped flies in the face of the fact that
regardless of the substance they are using the UN conference as a fundraising
and
mobilization opportunity. and they would have REGARDLESS of what was
in or
out of the programme of action in the sameway they made the firearms
protocol
evidence of an international conspiracy to ban all guns. Anyone with
any
experience dealing wiith the NRA knows thatif, at this point the UN
proposed
giving everyone in the world a handgun for protection, the NRA would
find a
way to twist it into an international conspiracy to ban all guns.
I think it is very unlikely that they will give it up regardless of
what
behind the scenes deals with the NRA and the US government however
well-intentioned. I have, frankly, been quite alarmed bysome of the
quiet lobbying in the
corridors to get IANSA to drop its support for insisting state responsiblity
for
effective controls on civilian possession be dropped from the programme
of
action.
Frankly I would have some serious concerns about the efforts to erode
IANSA's position in order to make it palatable to the US given the
strong support
for holding the line on civilian possession that has emerged from the
regions
and the facts reiterated repeatedly in the credible research on the
issue - for
example from the small arms survey - that
a) the bulk of the world's small arms are in the hands of civilians
and
b)that the majority of deaths in regions such as central/south america
and
south africa are the result of illicit handguns not military assault
weapons
and that
c) once you move beyond fully automatic miltiary assault weapons (a
major
problem in some regions not others)
d) also the american NGOs may know better but the change in the senate
may
loosen the NRAstranglehold on washington.
I doubt very much that the conflict oriented NGOs would countenance
a
solution based on the standard that it was acceptable to the weapons
makers and so I
find the US government/ NRA test a bit strange.
I think the blurring of the boundaries between who is in and out of
government is an issue we have discussed previously with respect to
funding etc. but
fundamentally NGOs are supposed to be NON governmental organizations
and I
think it would be a shame, at this stage if IANSA was coopted.
There are reasons I am not a diplomat.
Wendy Cukier
-----------------------------------
This is a reply to Ms Cukier from Philip Alpers of New Zealand
-----------------------------
From: "Philip Alpers"
"Gun Lobby Pressure"
Date: Thu, 7 Jun 2001 14:11:38 +1200
I side strongly with Wendy and the other NGOs who've spent so many years
being bullied by the tiny, but vociferous US gun lobby. Flapping around
the
corridors of the UN trying to buy a quiet life by offering the NRA
a slab of red meat
is not my idea of standing up for the victims. In doing so we'd abandon
nearly
half the people affected by small arms-related death and injury, the
women
caught in family violence, the despairing youth whose impulse suicides
are
guaranteed such a high "completion rate" by the easy availability
of a gun,
and the toddlers who blow away their siblings with a supposedly less
harmful
"non-military" weapon found under a bed.
As such deaths occur in large numbers in all hemispheres, it's not valid
to
imagine that by concentrating on "military" weapons we'd be focusing
our
benevolence on the less fortunate. Sure, NGOs would avoid a little
lobbying
and Internet abuse, but the result would be the small arms equivalent
of
allowing the US to dominate world policy on landmines.
Philip Alpers
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