Edith M. Lederer
Associated Press
via The Chicago Sun-Times
3/28/2013
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Iran and North Korea have blocked adoption of a global treaty that would regulate the multimillion-dollar international arms trade.
To be approved, the draft treaty needed support from all 193 U.N. member states.
Supporters of the treaty said that if the treaty was not adopted they would go to the General Assembly and put the draft to a vote where they expect overwhelming approval…
…“We need a treaty,” China’s U.N. Ambassador Li Baodong told The Associated Press on Wednesday. “We hope for consensus.”
There has never been an international treaty regulating the estimated $60 billion global arms trade. For more than a decade, activists and some governments have been pushing for international rules to try to keep illicit weapons out of the hands of terrorists, insurgent fighters and organized crime.
“It’s important for each and every country in the world that we have a regulation of the international arms trade,” Germany’s U.N. Ambassador Peter Wittig told the AP. “There are still some divergences of views, but I trust we can overcome them.”…
The complete article is at The Chicago Sun-Times
