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GUN OWNERS ALLIANCE
!!ALERT!!
Chris W. Stark - Director
P.O. Box 1924
Crosby, Texas 77532-1924
Ph. (281) 787-4111 Fax (281) 328-7505
http://www.GOA-Texas.org
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
11/24/1999
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UN Global Gun Grab
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Copyright � 1999 by The New American.
Republication permitted ONLY if this e-mail alert
is left intact in its original state.
For additional information, go to http://www.goa-texas.org/U_nation.htm
Vol. 15, No. 24
November 22, 1999
Global Gun Grab
http://www.thenewamerican.com/tna/1999/11-22-99/vo15no24_gun.htm
by Thomas R. Eddlem
It's open season on the right to keep and bear arms as UN globocrats
gear
up for international gun controls.
The United Nations is very troubled that the United States has retained
its Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees that
"the
right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."
Radical
new UN proposals treat free people with the means to effect their own
self
defense as a vital threat to the United Nations and its quest for what
it
calls the "peace-building process."
More troubling still is the fact that for the first time this radical UN
agenda represents a clear and present danger to our right to keep and
bear
arms. This is in part because the Clinton State Department is
collaborating
with the UN and its proposals. But another, perhaps more dangerous,
prong
of the UN attack on the right to keep and bear arms comes from an
insidious
quasi-private institution heavily funded by socialist Northern European
governments. This little-known, UN-backed organization charges itself
with
developing "message strategies" and "campaigning and advocacy
strategies"
to obtain a UN-managed global ban on the private ownership of firearms.
See:
DEPARTMENT OF STATE PUBLICATION 7277, THE UNITED STATES PROGRAM FOR
GENERAL
AND COMPLETE DISARMAMENT IN A PEACEFUL WORLD
http://www.mikenew.com/pub7277.html
Anti-Gun Agenda
The United Nations "Report of the Group of Governmental Experts on
Small Arms" issued on August 19th bitterly complains that "there are
wide differences among States [nations] as regards which types of arms
are permitted for civilian possession, and as regards the circumstances
under which they can legitimately be owned, carried and used. Such wide
variation in national laws raise difficulties for effective regional or
international coordination." That the UN "experts" are complaining
mainly
about the United States is made clear from the concluding
recommendations
in the report. Among the "coordination" proposals adopted by the panel,
enthusiastically seconded by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in his
foreword to the report � are the following:
� "All States should ensure that they have in place adequate laws,
regulations and administrative procedures to exercise effective control
over the legal possession of small arms and light weapons and over their
transfer...."
� "States are encouraged to integrate measures to control
ammunition...."
� "States should work toward � the prohibition of unrestricted trade and
private ownership of small arms and light weapons...."
The UN report defines small arms to include just about every category of
firearms that exists: "The category of small arms includes revolvers and
self-loading pistols, rifles and carbines, sub-machine guns, assault
rifles
and light machine guns." The United Nations call for banning even
hunting
rifles and antique revolvers from civilian possession demonstrates the
radical and groundbreaking nature of the report.
Though the current United Nations attack on the Second Amendment fails
to
take aim at civilian possession of shotguns, shotgun owners should find
no
security in the current UN focus. The UN report in no way limits global
firearms restrictions to "military"-related firearms such as "revolvers"
and "rifles." The UN "experts" explain that the United Nations must
deal
with firearms on social as well as military criteria: "Virtually every
part
of the United Nations system is dealing in one way or another with the
consequences of the armed conflicts, insecurity, violence, crime, social
disruption, displaced peoples and human suffering that are directly or
indirectly associated with the wide availability and the use of these
weapons."
To implement their gun control measures, UN officials plan to ignore the
reservation of national sovereignty guaranteed in the UN Charter the
same
way that the U.S. Congress often ignores the 10th Amendment to the U.S.
Constitution. The UN Charter bans UN intervention in "matters which are
essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state," but the UN
is
no longer concerned with legal niceties. Annan explained in his
September
22nd address before the UN General Assembly that "state sovereignty, in
its most basic sense, is being redefined.... A new, broader definition
of
national interest is needed in the new century [where] the collective
interest is the national interest." In Annan's view, the "collective
interest" mandates that Americans and other peoples of the world should
not own firearms and that the UN should be the key organ charged with
collecting them. Annan emphasized in a September 24th speech that
"controlling the easy availability of small arms is a prerequisite for
a successful peace-building process," which is why the "United Nations
has played a leading role in putting the issue of small arms firmly on
the international agenda."
UN control over a global movement to ban private firearms ownership has
already begun. According to a September 23rd UN press release, the
United
Nations convened a two-day workshop to set up a test arms register and
"database" maintained by the UN for the entire continent of Africa.
There
have already been calls to make this regional database binding on all
nations.
Clinton Administration Assent
More troubling than the fact that a corrupt United Nations is seeking to
attack the U.S. Bill of Rights and confiscate firearms legally owned by
American citizens is the fact that the Clinton administration has been
actively conspiring with the United Nations to accomplish this
subversive
goal. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan emphasizes in his foreword to the
"Report of the Group of Governmental Experts on Small Arms" that it was
"prepared, and adopted by consensus" and was the product of "unanimity"
among the "expert" members of the group. Based upon Annan's statement,
we can presume that none of the "experts" object to such a naked attack
on the right to bear arms. Yet among the "experts" who drafted the
report
was U.S. State Department Senior Foreign Affairs Specialist Herbert L.
Calhoun.
State Department assistance to the UN global gun grab agenda dates back
to at least 1994, when the Washington Times reported in its May 24th
edition that "the Clinton administration has agreed to participate in
a discussion of ways for the United Nations to control the manufacture
of guns and their sales to civilians.... The UN working paper declares
that governments individually are `impotent' to deal with global arms
trafficking and proposes `harmonization' of gun control standards around
the world to make trafficking easier to spot and prevent." The Times
report noted that "any `harmonization' would inevitably mean tightening
controls on the loosely regulated U.S. gun business."
State Department officials have expressed general sympathies with the
current UN proposals without mentioning the specific attack on citizen
firearms ownership. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told the
first-ever UN Security Council Small Arms Ministerial on September 24th
that "the United States strongly supports these steps," that we "welcome
the important precedent which the UN has set," and that the U.S. would
work to "commit to finishing negotiations on a firearms protocol to the
UN Transnational Organized Crime Convention by the end of 2000."
"The United Nations' call for gun control is an affront to our way of
life and our constitutional government," Representative Ron Paul (R-TX)
told The New American. "Mixing gun control with internationalism is
certain to result in an assault on American rights and liberties."
Representative Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD) pointed out to The New American
that the UN's escalating gun confiscation campaign "fits the pattern
of a UN that's become a refuge and a foundation for promoting socialism
and undermining national sovereignty and individual freedom." The eager
involvement of the Clinton/Albright State Department in that campaign
illustrates anew the administration's contempt for the Constitution,
the rule of law, and our national independence.
NGO Advocacy
Conspiring officials within the Clinton administration do not constitute
the only prong of the UN assault on the right to keep and bear arms.
The UN has established within its Department for Disarmament Affairs
a department of Coordinating Action on Small Arms (CASA). According to
an August 14th UN press release, CASA would be charged with coordinating
all UN small arms control efforts, including a responsibility "to
encourage
civil society involvement in building societal resistance to violence."
The reference to "civil society" suggests that the UN is trying to
mobilize
private sector Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and citizen
pressure
on behalf of its agenda.
The attempt to generate pressure from below as well as from above has
already obtained results. In November 1998 the UNESCO Courier suggested
that "the political tides may be changing. An international campaign is
now
underway with non-governmental organizations of all stripes and colours
�
disarmament and gun control groups along with development and human
rights
associations in the North and South � building common ground with the
active
support of governments like Mali, Canada, Norway and Japan."
This year the international campaign sought by the UNESCO Courier
acquired an
organizational face, although there is very little "non-governmental"
about it.
Annan specifically cited this new organization, as well as the
UN-generated
"momentum" justifying this impending power grab, in his September 24th
address
on small arms: "The momentum for combating small arms proliferation has
also
come from civil society, which has been increasingly active on this
issue.
The establishment early this year of the International Action Network on
Small Arms [IANSA] has helped to sharpen public focus on small arms,
which
has helped us gain the public support necessary for success." IANSA is
intended to "provide a transnational framework" for the mobilization of
a broad citizen movement in favor of gun control, according to the
organizational goals posted on its website. The services IANSA intends
to
provide the UN-led global gun control movement include "campaigning and
advocacy strategies," "developing culturally appropriate `message'
strategies," "information sharing" among NGOs, and "constituency
building."
Funding for this incipient propaganda campaign comes from the public
trough
of the taxpayers of the European socialist nations. IANSA notes on its
website
that its eight most significant financial donors include five government
agencies: The Belgian Ministry for Development Cooperation; the Swedish
Ministry of Foreign Affairs; the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign
Affairs;
the United Kingdom Department for International Development; and the
Finnish
Ministry of Foreign Affairs. (The remaining three are small, pacifist,
U.S.-based tax-exempt foundations.)
Clinton's "Buy-back" Initiative
On September 9th, Bill Clinton unveiled a proposal that represents yet
another prong of the UN-directed global gun grab: A $15 million federal
gun "buy-back" initiative to be implemented by the Department of Housing
and Urban Development (HUD). Through subsidies from HUD, local police
departments will be awarded up to $500,000 to collect and destroy an
estimated 300,000 firearms. The UN Centre for Disarmament Affairs
(UNCDA)
refers to such "buy-backs" as a "practical method of micro-disarmament,"
which has been field-tested by municipal governments in the U.S. � and
by UN "peacekeeping" forces in Haiti, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and other
countries. A 1995 UNCDA paper by Dr. Edward J. Laurance, a consultant to
the UN Register of Conventional Arms since 1992, notes that the UNCDA
has
studied both "buy-back programs as practiced in many American cities"
and
those "conducted by the U.S. Army in Haiti" � the latter being part of a
"peacekeeping" mission carried out on orders from the UN Security
Council.
According to Dr. Laurance, government "buy-backs" of small arms "must be
conducted in parallel with other efforts," such as "seizure programs."
He
also points out that "buy-backs" have a propaganda benefit, in that they
focus "attention on the link between weapons availability and crime" �
thereby preparing the public for more aggressive civilian disarmament
measures. To illustrate a UN-supervised civilian "micro-disarmament"
program that worked, he refers to El Salvador's "new laws outlawing
possession of military weapons and requiring all citizens to register
hand guns and personal weapons. A new police force was created [and]
trained under UN supervision � [which] received specialized training
in searching for, confiscating and destroying � military-style
weapons...."
Sami Faltas of the Bonn International Centre for Conversion, an
international
"think tank" that has advised UN officials on civilian disarmament
programs
around the world (and for which Dr. Laurance serves as a consultant),
has
laid out the program with stunning candor:
A subtle mix of rewards and penalties is needed for a weapons
[confiscation]
program to succeed. Ultimately, the ownership of arms should not be
left to
the personal choice of individuals. The state needs to preserve its
monopoly
of the legitimate use of force. So sanctions against the illegal
possession
and use of arms are necessary and should be imposed. However, during a
weapons collection program, an amnesty is needed, and the emphasis
should
be on voluntary compliance and positive incentives.
The equation is quite easy to understand: Gun "buy-backs" prepare the
public
for uniform gun registration, which leads to universal gun confiscation
and
a state monopoly on lethal force. This was the process that led to mass
murder
of subject populations in Soviet Russia, National Socialist Germany,
Communist
China, and other despotisms. With the covert aid of the Clinton
administration,
the UN is now implementing this process on a global basis.
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Help Support the work of Gun Owners Alliance! Go to:
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Copyright � 1999 by Gun Owners Alliance (GOA-Texas). Republication
permitted ONLY if this e-mail alert is left intact in its original
state. The views herein do not necessarily reflect the views of
any other individual or organization, than Gun Owners Alliance
(GOA-Texas). We do not officially represent Gun Owners of America.
Go to http://www.goa-texas.org/TXsig.htm for more information.
_________________________________________________________________
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