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U.N. investigating whether e-mails from U.S. gun enthusiasts a security threat
By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press WriterUNITED NATIONS (AP) -- The United
Nations is investigating whether irate letters and e-mails it has received
from American gun enthusiasts protesting an upcoming conference on the
illicit trade in small arms constitutes a security threat.The world body has
received about 100 complaints from Americans who erroneously believe the
conference seeks to infringe on their right to bear arms, U.N.
Undersecretary-General for Disarmament Jayantha Dhanapala said Thursday.The
gun-rights enthusiasts did not threaten physical harm to any U.N. official
but their protests were strongly worded and were turned over to U.N. security
experts, Dhanapala said."What concerned me was that there was a widespread
campaign," he said. "It's essentially a U.S.-based phenomenon."The letters
and e-mails started arriving in recent weeks, some signed and some anonymous,
alleging that the U.N. is attempting to take away guns from people, in
conflict with the constitutional rights of U.S. citizens, Dhanapala told a
news conference."I did not get the impression that they have been
orchestrated. They are differently worded, but clearly they all labor under
the same misapprehension about the conference," he said.Dhanapala's office
released a pamphlet called "Setting the Record Straight" to address the
misconceptions they contained and explain what the conference hopes to
achieve."The focus of the conference is on illicit trade in small arms, not
the legal trade, manufacture or ownership of weapons," the pamphlet stressed.
"The U.N. conference will have no effect on the rights of civilians to
legally own and bear arms."Delegates are expected to adopt a program of
action, which is not legally binding, to curb and ultimately eliminate
illegal trafficking in assault rifles and other small arms that have become
the weapons of choice in many internal conflicts around the world.Asked about
the fears of some Americans that the United Nations is trying to take away
their guns, Secretary-General Kofi Annan stressed that the main goal of the
conference is to try to control the illicit arms trade "to ensure that guns
do not get into the wrong hands.""When you look at the history of the last 20
years or so, most of the killing in the world, apart from the AIDS epidemic,
is being done by small arms," he said.About a dozen gun-rights groups,
including the U.S. National Rifle Association, are among the 177
non-governmental organizations accredited to attend the two-week conference
which begins Monday.Dhanapala said these groups will be able to attend all
public meetings and will choose several representatives to make statements at
one official conference session.U.N. conventional arms expert Joao Honwana, a
top conference official, said it wasn't up to the U.N. Department for
Disarmament Affairs to judge whether the e-mails and letters constituted a
threat."The objective of turning these e-mail and communications to the U.N.
security was precisely to allow them to assess them from a perspective of
threat to the organization of the conference and take whatever necessary
measures they found appropriate, which is what they are doing," he said."They
analyze those communications, and I'm sure that they will contact with the
appropriate institutions in this country and elsewhere to make sure that
whatever is said in those e-mails does not represent a major threat to the
organization of this conference," Honwana said.AP-ES-07-05-01 2230EDT
"We're not supposed to be perfect. We're supposed to be Useful."
Leonard Peltier
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Visit and show your support for the Grass Roots Oyate http://members.tripod.com/GrassRootsOyate Clemency for Leonard Peltier. Sign the Petition. http://petitiononline.com/Release/petition.html
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