HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
Arms Division
A U.S. soldier is shown holding a prototype of a blinding lasers, which Human Rights Watch denounced as “cruel and inhumane” and helped to ban. The Arms Division of Human Rights Watch was established after the cold war to address the problem of the role of arms in human rights abuses. Since 1992, we have worked to monitor and curb the transfer of weapons to military forces that commit gross violations of internationally recognized human rights or international humanitarian law. In addition, we work to ban inhumane weapons and to promote greater transparency in the arms trade. We endeavor to keep weapons out of the hands of known human rights abusers, and thereby prevent the most serious and systematic violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, including and especially genocide. Our overall goal is to establish new norms—against indiscriminate and cruel weapons, like landmines or blinding laser weapons, and against military support of known human rights abusers—and to enforce established norms, such as those banning chemical and biological weapons. We believe that governments and private suppliers bear a political and moral responsibility when the weapons they manufacture and distribute are used to commit human rights abuses. Through our investigative research of the arms trade—which takes us to the areas where weapons are transshipped, delivered, unloaded, and used—we trace the flow of these weapons and expose their source. We also track military training and assistance in order to demonstrate governments' complicity in abuses that occur. On the basis of our findings, we stigmatize those responsible and encourage governments to cut off the flow of arms to abusive forces.To stem the use of such weapons against civilians, we also call for multilateral controls over the brisk international trade in small arms and light weapons. In the case of weapons that under international humanitarian law are inherently indiscriminate, such as landmines and chemical and biological weapons, or that cause unnecessary suffering, such as blinding lasers and other new weapons currently under development, we press governments to halt their production, stockpiling, export, and use altogether. Our work affords a unique perspective on the arms trade and its link to abuse, allowing us to identify potentially explosive situations at an early stage and to give early warning. By curbing the transfer of weapons to human rights abusers—whether they be governments or non-state actors—and helping enact bans against indiscriminate and cruel weapons, we hope to contribute to the protection of human rights and regional peace and stability worldwide. The Arms Division's research and advocacy efforts are described in From Conventional to Futuristic: Tackling the Arms Trade, Banning Inhumane Weapons and A Short Outline of Mandate, Goals, Methodology and Positions.
Human Rights Watch reports addressing arms transfers and military assistance to abusive military forces and groups include: Global Trade, Local Impact: Arms Transfers to all Sides in the Civil War in Sudan (August 1998); Colombia's Killer Networks: The Military-Paramilitary Partnership and the United States (November 1996); Civilian Pawns: Laws of War Violations and the Use of Weapons on the Israel-Lebanon Border (May 1996); Angola: Between War And Peace: Arms Trade and Human Rights Abuses since the Lusaka Protocol (February 1996); Turkey: Weapons Transfers and Violations of the Laws of War (November 1995); Rwanda/Zaire: International Support for the Perpetrators of the Rwandan Genocide (May 1995); Cambodia at War (April 1995); Georgia/Abkhazia: Violations of the Laws of War and Russia's Role in the Conflict (March 1995); U.S. Cluster Bombs to Turkey?(December 1994); Angola: Arms Trade and Violations of the Laws of War since the 1992 Elections (November 1994); Arms and Abuses in Indian Punjab and Kashmir (September 1994); and Arming Rwanda: The Arms Trade and Human Rights Abuses in the Rwandan War (January 1994). In addition, Joost Hiltermann, executive director of the Arms Division of Human Rights Watch, has authored several conference papers and published articles, including "Human Rights Abuses and Arms Trafficking in Central Africa," "Stemming the Flow of Arms into Africa" and "Perspectives on Intervention and Conflict Resolution in Africa." Stephen Goose, program director of the Arms Division, co-authored with Frank Smyth an article entitled "Arming Genocide in Rwanda," which appeared in Foreign Affairs, September/October 1994.
Since December 1997, over 130 governments have signed this treaty and over 50 have ratified it. The treaty will enter into force on March 1, 1999. Human Rights Watch was a central participant in the treaty negotiations, known as the Ottawa Process, and is now working to universalize, ratify and monitor the implementation of this historic agreement. Human Rights Watch is chair of the ICBL's Treaty Working Group and is a member of the Landmine Monitor Core Group. Human Right Watch prepared a comprehensive report entitled Our work on landmines has also included a comprehensive report entitled Landmines: A Deadly Legacy (October 1993). Recent Human Rights Watch publications include four Fact Sheets on landmines, The Mine Ban Treaty and the Americas (January 1999), The Mine Ban Treaty and Members of APEC (October 1998), The Mine Ban Treaty and the Middle East/North Africa (July 1998) and The Mine Ban Treaty and Africa (May 1998). Our work also has included the following reports: Killers in the Commonwealth (October 1997); In Its Own Words: The U.S. Army and Antipersonnel Mines in the Korean and Vietnam Wars (July 1997); Still Killing: Landmines in Southern Africa (May 1997); Exposing the Source: U.S. Companies and the Production of Antipersonnel Mines (April 1997); Landmines in Mozambique (March 1994); Landmines in Angola (January 1993); Hidden Death: Landmines and Civilian Casualties in Iraqi Kurdistan (October 1992); Landmines in Cambodia: The Coward's War (September 1991); and Landmines in El Salvador and Nicaragua: The Civilian Victims (December 1986).
Article 35 (2) of Protocol I to the 1949 Geneva Conventions (1977) "Indiscriminate attacks are prohibited, [including] those which employ a method or means of combat which cannot be directed at a specific military objective or...which cannot be limited as required by this Protocol." Article 51 (4) (b) (c) of Protocol I to the 1949 Geneva Conventions (1977) Human Rights Watch is dedicated to reducing the inherent threat to human
rights posed by indiscriminate and cruel weapons. Beyond our groundbreaking
work on landmines, our efforts have focused
on the troubling development of new antipersonnel weapons, as well as chemical
and biological weapons. This work is grounded in international legal standards,
as set forth in the Martens clause, the 1949 Geneva Conventions, the 1977
Additional Protocols, the 1980 Convention on Conventional Weapons, and
other instruments of international humanitarian law.
Human Rights Watch's work on proposed "new generation" antipersonnel weapons has created pressure for strengthened international norms against the development and use of inhumane weapons. When assessing the danger posed by new weapons, we evaluate them according to international humanitarian standards. Specifically, we determine whether they are indiscriminate, cause superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering, cause disproportionate harm to civilians, or are inconsistent with the dictates of public conscience. These principles of international humanitarian law are contained in the Martens clause and Protocols I Additional to the 1949 Geneva Conventions. Human Rights Watch has found that alarming advances in military technology, since these legal instruments have been in place, necessitate stringent monitoring and strengthened prohibitions addressing specific inhumane weapons. Blinding laser weapons, for example, offer
the military capacity to deliberately and permanently blind a person. Human
Rights Watch voiced its concerns about these weapons in two hardhitting
reports, Blinding
Laser Weapons: The Need to Ban a Cruel and Inhumane Weapon (September
1995) and U.S.
Blinding Laser Weapons (May 1995). Our calls for an international
ban on blinding laser weapons led to the drafting of Protocol IV to the
Convention on Conventional Weapons. The Blinding Laser Protocol was adopted
in 1995, marking only the second time in history that a weapon system was
banned before it entered into widespread production. Shortly after the
ban went into force in mid-1998, in a detailed letter to the U.S. Secretary
of Defense, we criticized U.S. efforts to develop dazzling laser weapons,
which threaten to severely undercut the new norm against blinding as a
method of warfare. In addition to monitoring implementation of the landmark
blinding laser ban, we work to monitor and halt the development of other
inhumane weapons.
The use of chemical or biological weapons is a serious abuse of human rights, as well as a violation of international law. The use of such weapons was banned under the 1925 Geneva Protocol, and subsequent international treaties have extended this prohibition. The 1972 Biological Weapons Convention outlaws the development, production, stockpiling, and use of biological weapons. Negotiations continue on a protocol to verify compliance with this treaty. The 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention imposes a complete ban on the development, production, stockpiling, and use of chemical weapons, provides for their destruction, and establishes inspection mechanisms to monitor compliance. To address the human rights threat presented by chemical and biological weapons, Human Rights Watch investigates credible allegations of the production, trade or use of such weapons and exposes the wrong-doing of governments or companies. Through our watchdog efforts, we also help enforce the legal norms barring such weapons. Our publications on this topic include Chemical Warfare in Bosnia? The Strange Experiences of the Srebrenica Survivors (November 1998) and Clouds of War: Chemical Weapons in the Former Yugoslavia (March 1997) . In addition, Arms Division researcher Ernst Jan Hogendoorn wrote "A Chemical Weapons Atlas," which appeared in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. The staff of the Arms Division can be reached at Human Rights Watch Arms Division, 1522 K Street, NW, #910, Washington, DC 20005-1202, USA, Tel: +1 (202) 371-6592, E-mail:hrwdc@hrw.org. The Arms Division of HRW is: Joost R. Hiltermann, Executive Director: hilterj@hrw.org Stephen D.Goose, Program Director: gooses@hrw.org Loretta Bondi, Advocacy Coordinator (arms trade): bondil@hrw.org Mary Wareham, Senior Advocate (landmines): wareham@hrw.org Ernst Jan "E.J." Hogendoorn, Research Associate (arms trade, inhumane weapons): hogende@hrw.org Alex Vines, Research Associate (landmines, Africa): hrwafricauk@gn.apc.org Lisa Misol, Sophie Silberberg Fellow (arms exporters): Jasmine Juteau, Landmines Associate (landmines, administration, information management): juteauj@hrw.org Sharda Sekaran, Associate (administration, information management): sekaras@hrw.org William M. Arkin, Consultant (inhumane weapons): warkin@igc.org The members of the Arms Division International Advisory Committee are: Dr. Torsten N. Wiesel, Chair
|
