Disarmament Commission 2010: facing the “guillotine of redundancy”?

The United Nations Disarmament Commission opened its 2010 session today. This deliberative body, mandated to make recommendations on issues related to disarmament, is in the second year of its current three year cycle. It struggled to adopt its agenda last year, but did eventually agree to work on three issues: 1) recommendations for achieving the objective of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation; 2) elements of a draft declaration of the 2010s as the fourth disarmament decade; and 3) practical confidence-building measures in the field of conventional weapons. It began work on the first of these two items last year, which it will continue this year.

Monday consisted of general debate statements. There is little to report from today’s meeting. Most delegations reiterated the importance of the Commission to get to work, noting that it has failed to produce anything for more than a decade. A few states commented on process. Pakistan’s Ambassador Haroon, responding to murmurs of abandoning the stalemated Conference on Disarmament in favour of an alternative negotiating process, argued that the current UN disarmament machinery cannot work if its members “try to bury, obfuscate or side-step genuine security concerns to push through a mirage of disarmament and non-proliferation related progress” and that it is important to prevent elements of the machinery from being put “under the guillotine of redundancy” just because not all member states “subscribe to certain world views”.

In terms of substance, most delegations mentioned current and upcoming initiatives to be supported, such as the preparatory process for the arms trade treaty negotiations, the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference, and the usual list of arms control and non-proliferation measures such as CTBT, FMCT, etc. One speaker, Ambassador Davide, Jr of the Philippines, voiced his delegation’s support for the establishment of “an international conference that will set the parameters for the elimination of nuclear weapons and prohibit their production, stockpiling, transfer, use or threat of use, and provide for the destruction of such weapons.” He noted that his delegation “gives much importance to having a specified time frame for the destruction of such weapons and the negotiation of Nuclear Weapons Convention.”

General debate will continue tomorrow. On Wednesday, the Commission will break into informal meetings to discuss the substance of two of the three working groups. Civil society will not be permitted to attend these meetings but will rejoin the Commission on 16 April when it reconvenes to adopt its reports.