Reporte: The Arms Trade Treaty and Military Equipment. The Case for a Comprehensive Scope

Safeworld, 2009.

Introducción original: 

The potential scope of an international Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) was a principal subject for discussion during the first meeting of the Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG1) in March 2009. In particular, discussion centred upon the types of equipment and the types of transactions that an ATT should cover. This briefing is intended as a contribution to the debate on one aspect of the former, i.e. the range of military equipment to which a Treaty should be applied. It examines the national lists of military equipment that are currently controlled by a number of national governments with a view to determining whether there exists a common framework on which further discussion could be based.

To be fully comprehensive an ATT must cover not just weapons platforms and systems but also their ammunition and components, arms and ammunition production equipment and technologies, internal security equipment, and dual-use items intended for military, security or police use.However, as this paper analyses national military lists its focus is, by definition, restricted to military equipment and technologies. Therefore it does not consider questions relating to the control of other equipment such as dual-use and internal security items. There are strong arguments in favour of an ATT encompassing these other types of equipment, however these will not be explored in detail within this particular publication.

Although this report does not survey all national arms transfer control jurisdictions, it is clear from the evidence contained herein that the overwhelming majority of arms transferred internationally – over 98.8 percent (see below) – are from jurisdictions that cover an extremely broad range of conventional military items, their ammunition and components, to the point where it could be considered that a comprehensive international standard is, to all intents and purposes, already in place. In addition, as this paper will demonstrate, there are indications that, as states update their national transfer control lists it is to this de facto standard they increasingly turn. This paper argues that it is both logical and efficient to use this approach as the basis for future discussions and/or negotiations concerning the military equipment to be controlled under an ATT.

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