http://www.un.org/disarmament/update/20130402/Following lengthy process which began in the 1990s, General Assembly today passes Arms Trade Treaty 2 April 2013 — Building on a process which began in the 1990s, the General Assembly today passed a resolution adopting an Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) to create a uniform framework covering the international trade in conventional arms. The aim of the treaty is to create a level playing field for the global arms trade, bringing to it more accountability, openness and transparency, and making it harder for human rights abusers, criminals and arms traffickers to obtain weapons.
The General Assembly meets to vote on the Arms Trade Treaty.
The vote by the General Assembly was 154 in favour, 3 against, and 23 abstentions. The Arms Trade Treaty process began in the 1990s when civil society actors and Nobel Peace Prize Laureates voiced their concern over the unregulated nature of the global arms trade and its impact on human security. Subsequently, a number of States developed an interest in the issue and began a formal process under the purview of the United Nations.
In 2006, the United Nations General Assembly requested countries to submit their views on a possible ATT. More than 100 countries did. These views were collected in a 2007 report of the UN Secretary-General.
In 2008 a Group of Governmental Experts examined the feasibility, scope and draft parameters for a comprehensive, legally binding instrument establishing common international standards for the import, export and transfer of conventional arms.
In 2009, an Open-ended Working Group – open to all UN Member States – held two meetings on an ATT. At the end of 2009, the General Assembly decided to convene a Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty in 2012 "to elaborate a legally binding instrument on the highest possible common international standards for the transfer of conventional arms". The Conference was preceded by four sessions of a Preparatory Committee.
The United Nations Conference on the ATT took place at the United Nations Headquarters in New York from 2-27 July 2012. After four weeks of complex and intense negotiations, the Conference concluded its work without an agreement on a text for a treaty.
The lack of an outcome on 27 July was a blow to the aspirations of large number of the United Nations membership, as well as sectors of the civil society that for almost a decade had been tirelessly advocating the adoption of an ATT. Member States nevertheless came very close to reaching an agreement and pledged to build on the work done by pursuing negotiations in the near future.
Before today's historic vote, the Final United Nations Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty took place at the United Nations Headquarters in New York from 18-28 March 2013. Building on the work of the July 2012 Conference,
it was designated as "final" to reflect the overwhelming commitment by many to conclude the ATT process and reach an agreement.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Ambassador_to_the_United_Nations
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_RiceSusan Elizabeth Rice (born November 17, 1964) is an American diplomat, former
Brookings Institution fellow, and the current United States Ambassador to the United Nations.
Rice served on the staff of the National Security Council and as Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs during President Bill Clinton's second term.
Rice was confirmed as UN ambassador by the U.S. Senate by unanimous consent on January 22, 2009. She is the first Jamaican-American woman to hold that office.
Rice was born in Washington, D.C.,[4] to
Emmett J. Rice (1919–2011), Cornell University economics professor and the second black governor of the Federal Reserve System;
[4] and education policy scholar Lois (née Dickson) Fitt, currently at the Brookings Institution.[5] Her maternal grandparents were Jamaican.[6] Her parents divorced during her youth.
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Rice attended Stanford University, where she received a Truman Scholarship, and graduated with a B.A. in history in 1986. She was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.[8][9]
Awarded a Rhodes Scholarship, Rice attended New College, Oxford, where she earned a M.Phil. in 1988 and D.Phil. in 1990.
The Chatham House-British International Studies Association honored her dissertation entitled, "Commonwealth Initiative in Zimbabwe, 1979-1980: Implication for International Peacekeeping" as the UK's most distinguished in international relations
