To the question posed in the ATT Monitor earlier this week—is the prevention of armed gender-based violence (GBV) important enough to screen for in export assessments?—the answer is yes! The final draft Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) text released on Wednesday indicated that preventing armed gender-based violence is indeed important enough to be part of mandatory export assessments.
The criterion on gender-based violence (GBV) is now binding. The new article 7(4) mandates exporting states parties explicitly, as part of the risk assessment process, to take into account the risk of the weapons, ammunition, parts, or components being used to commit or facilitate serious acts of gender-based violence or violence against women and children. States shall not be permitted to authorize the transfer where there is an overriding risk of GBV when it constitutes one of the negative consequences of article 7(1)—i.e. when it is a violation of international humanitarian law (IHL) or international human rights law (IHRL), when it undermines peace and security, or when it forms part of transnational organised crime.
Having
the explicit, binding criterion on preventing GBV in article 7(4) also requires
states to act with due diligence to ensure the arms transfer would not be
diverted to non-state actors such as death squads, militias, or gangs that
commit acts of gender-based violence.
The
criterion is not as strong as demanded by the 100+ delegations supporting a
strengthened provision for preventing GBV. They wanted the criterion to be
included in article 7(1). However, the current formulation does improve the
extremely weak language in previous drafts.
The
biggest problem remains that the criteria threshold is “overriding risk” rather
than “substantial risk”. This weakness affects all of article 7—there is a risk
that the exporting state could determine that some unidentified interest is
more important that preventing violations of IHL and IHRL. Furthermore, risk assessments relating to this
article will to a large extent depend on how “peace and security” is interpreted.
Clear interpretative statements from governments and political pressure from civil
society and others will remain crucial to ensure that the correct
interpretation of the article is implemented.
A
strong preamble could have helped with interpretation. Regrettably, the
preambular reference to gender-based violence, and its relationship with IHL
and IHRL, was removed from the draft treaty text. The paragraph also does not
reference women’s agency and participation, despite agreed language on this in
consensus-based General Assembly resolutions and other UN documents. The
preamble now only refers to “women and children” as particularly affected by
armed conflict and armed violence. We have written many times about the incorrect
and patronizing effect of grouping together women and children and insinuating
that women are inherently vulnerable. Legally we are not one group. In reality
we are not one group. It’s unfortunate that this trope is perpetuated in the
ATT. It highlights to us all once again that our work on gender equality must
continue!
WILPF,
the committed ATT gender team and our partners have mobilized in New York and
far beyond on the GBV aspects of the arms trade and we have called for action
to make GBV prevention legally-binding. The improved criterion on preventing
GBV is due to the tireless efforts of many delegations, particularly Iceland, and
the 100+ states and civil society organizations that supported a stronger
provision to prevent armed GBV. Our collective call has been respected, as this
text makes prevention of GBV explicit and its exclusion less possible. If
adopted or not, we must now build upon this historic momentum to respond to the
rights of those affected by armed gender-based violence and to prevent sales of
arms that would affect the countless more.
