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(<- Previous Report) May 29th (Next Report ->)
Diana Takata, National Director of Students for a Free Tibet, addresses the audience witnessing of the signing of the International Code of Conduct on Arms Transfers. Diana, having met the walkers earlier in the week invited them to attend the press conference where statements were made by 8 Nobel Peace Prize Laureates including His Holiness The Dalai Lama.
In a conference room adjacent to St. John's Cathedral in New York City, Thubten Jigme Norbu attended a meeting of the Nobel Peace Prize Laureates prior to the afternoon press conference. Norbu, who is currently in the process of raising funds to build an interdenominational Buddhist temple in Bloomington, Indiana, introduced himself to many of the Laureates.
In June of 1996 His Holiness visited Bloomington to bless the cornerstone of the temple Norbu plans to build, and to name it Chamtsee Ling, a Temple of Love and Compassion. One aspect of the temple will be to honor all Nobel Peace Prize Laureates with individual plaques and a library containing the written work of these distinguished humanitarians.
From the relative calm of the pre-press conference meeting room...
...to the mad dash across the courtyard...
...into St. John's Synod Hall...
...finally, into the face of an overflowing crowd of journalists, Students for a Free Tibet, members of the Tibetan Community and lucky curiosity seekers who managed to get in, His Holiness and His fellow Nobel Laureates greet the crowd.
Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA), Sponsor of the Arms Trade Code of Conduct in the United States House of Representatives on behalf of the U.S. movement of the No Arms to Dictators Code of Conduct introduced the Nobel Peace Laureates and representatives of Nobel Peace Prize winning organizations who gathered to sign the Code of Conduct. Those present were His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Dr. Oscar Arias, Dr. Jose Ramos-Horta, Dr. Elie Weisel, Betty Williams, Dr. Donald Gann of American Friends Service Committee, Dr. Susan Waltz of Amnesty International, and Dr. Gururaj Mutalik of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War.
Opening the the evening with a strong statement, McKinney said, "We have all come here because we want the freedom loving peoples around the world to rally with us and to hear us as we say we have had enough. We've had enough of the death and murder and destruction that rages around the world. We've had enough of the tyrants inflicting despair and misery on the common folks, and more importantly, we've had enough of the excuses that certain governments give for persisting in the deadliest of weapons trades: those to repressive regimes."
McKinney, pointing out Britain's New Labor Party leader Tony Blair's firm stance on supporting an arms trade code of conduct, called for the Clinton Administration "to not side step the moral issue of selling to repressive regimes around the world, weapons whose only function is to kill people." McKinney hoped that we will soon see the day when the Nobel Peace Laureates International Code of Conduct is a reality, and "then governments that violate basic human rights and deny their citizens the right to choose their own leaders will find themselves without the tools of control and repression."
Dr. Oscar Arias, former president of Costa Rica, made the following statement regarding the International Code of Conduct on Arms Transfers:
"We come from different nations with varied histories and in the past the world has honored each of our struggles for peace and justice with a Nobel Prize for Peace. Today we speak as one to voice our common concern regarding the destructive affects of the unregulated arms trade. Together we have written an International Code of Conduct on Arms Transfers which, once adopted by all arms selling nations will benefit all humanity, nationalities, ethnicities and religions. This international code of conduct would govern all arms transfers including conventional weapons and munitions, military and security training, and sensitive military dual use technologies. The code stipulates that any country wishing to purchase arms must meet certain criteria, including the promotion of democracy, the protection of human rights and transparency in military spending. It would also prohibit arms sales to nations that support terrorism and to states that are engaged in aggression against other nations or peoples.
The international community can no longer ignore the repercussions of irresponsible arms transfers. Indiscriminate weapons sales force political instability and human rights violations prolong violent conflicts and weaken diplomatic efforts to resolve differences peacefully. Arms transfers often take place under a cloud of secrecy and generally respond to the desires of a few while ignoring the needs and rights of the many. Sadly, many governments continue to divert scarce resources towards arms purchases while their people live in abject poverty. Millions of civilians have been killed in conflict this century and many more have lost their loved ones, their homes, their spirit. In a world where 1.3 billion people earn less than one dollar a day the sale of weapons simply perpetrates poverty.
Our children urgently need schools and health centers not machine guns and fighter planes. Our children also need to be protected from violence. The dictators of this world, not the poor, clamor for arms. Once in affect this International Code of Conduct on Arms Transfers would prevent undemocratic governments from building sophisticated arsenals. Governments who systematically abuse internationally recognized human rights through practices such as torture or arbitrary executions would not receive military training. Countries who commit genocide would not be able to buy munitions. Governments engaged in armed aggression against other countries or peoples could not buy missiles. States that support terrorism would be prevented from acquiring weapons. In addition, all nations would be required to report their arms purchases to the United Nations. This code of conduct would undeniably promote global peace and security and protect human rights.
We call on all nations to endorse this International Code of Conduct of Arms Transfers. The citizens of the world must demand their leaders support of this code, as well as similar efforts on the national and regional level. Only through solidarity, compassion and courageous leadership can we make violence and its vestiges a distance memory of the past.
Friends, allow me to expand on why I convened this group Nobel Peace Laureates to write an International Code on Arms Transfers. War and the preparation for war is one of the greatest obstacles to human progress. Violence does not resolve problems rather it fosters a vicious cycle of arms build up, conflict and poverty. Yet, instead of address the root causes of conflict many states often utilize military might in order to control increasingly desperate populations. Many developing countries continue to be burdened by high percentages of their population living in misery.
Let us not forget the magnitude of the challenges that face us as we enter the 21st century. In today's world nearly 1 billion people are illiterate, more than 1 billion lack access to potable water and 1.3 billion earn less than 1 dollar a day. Unfortunately half of the world governments dedicate more resources to defense expenditures than to help the problems. Imagine what we could do if a portion of world military spending was redirected toward investment in human development. In 1995 world military spending totaled nearly 800 billion dollars. If we redirected just 40 billion dollars of those resources over the next ten years to fight poverty all of the world's population would enjoy basic social services such as education, health care and nutrition, reproductive health, clean water and sanitation. Another 40 billion dollars would provide all people on the planet with an income above the poverty line of their country.
World leaders must make human security the priority of the 21st century. In contrast to the traditional concept of security linked to military capacity and economic power, human security represents the degree to which human beings are protected from ignorance, sickness, hunger, neglect and persecution. Until the demands for human security are meet these will continue to boil in all regions of the world escalating into violent confrontations. History has recorded more devastating conflicts in this century than ever before. While our technological capability to destroy has multiplied our ability to empathize with the problems of the inflicted has minimized. Who can forget the massacres of millions in the Russian Revolution, The Holocaust, Japan, Cambodia.
As we approach the turn of the century our common future is threatened by regional conflicts and arms races that are raging around the world. The people of Somalia and Pakistan cannot attest that the end of The Cold War has not brought political stability to all regions of the world. The people of East Timor and Tibet are acutely aware that not all people enjoy the right to self determination. The fate of ****, the 1991 Nobel Peace Laureate and supporters of her democratic party, depicts how the regime of Burma has responded to the clamor for democracy by firing bullets. In this case, as in many others, the indiscriminate international arms trade has empowered nondemocratic governments to stifle independence movements and intensify territorial conflicts.
Since the end of The Cold War many neutralized nations have reduced their defense budgets. Thus, those countries arms merchants have turned to the developing world for the majority of conflicts take place today for new clients. In 1994 arms transfers to the developing world totaled 25.4 billion dollars. Together the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Counsel, France, The United States, China, Russia, and The United Kingdom, where responsible for over 90% of those arms transfers. Ironically, those entrusted with guaranteeing world security seek to ensure their own economic prosperity through the sale of weapons. In 1993 The United States was responsible for 73% of arms sales to the developing world. Even more incredibly, 90% of the US arms customers that year were not democracies and over two thirds were recognized by the U.S. Department of State as human rights abusers.
For many industrialized countries that manufacture arms, economic prosperity is seen as partially contingent on a thriving military industry. Armament production is viewed by many as indispensable for technological development and a vital source of employment. World leaders must accept the fact that we cannot let the free market rule international arms trade. We must not enrich ourselves through the sale of death. Only blindness, my friends, would hide from us the fact that the arms trade is the friend of dictators and an enemy of the people. The time has come to make people more important than arms.
For these reasons in 1995, I proposed to my fellow Nobel Peace Laureates that we join together to write an International Code of Conduct on Arms Transfers. Some might question the cause relationship to the supply and demand concept of the free market. If a country's leaders want arms, some might ask, who are we to say that they shouldn't have them? That question merits two responses. First, as I stated above, the arms manufactures have been aggressively promoting sales to the developing world in order to make up for the drastic reduction in arms procurement by most industrialized countries since the end of The Cold War. Further more, when one asserts that a country wants arms, to whom exactly are we referring? Is it the single mother in Indonesia, or the orphan who lives on the street in Egypt who are pressuring their leaders to buy guns and missiles? Or is it a dictator such as President Mobutu of Zaire, who sees arms purchases as the only way to maintain power? The poor of the world are crying out for schools and doctors not guns and generals.
Another argument to justify the sale of arms is that if one country does not sell arms to a nation that wishes to buy them someone else will. That is precisely why all arms selling nations must agree to certain restrictions. Only a comprehensive international effort to monitor and regulate arms transfers will be affective. We can no longer say business is business and turn a blind eye on the poverty and oppression caused by arms transfers. Just like the slavery and the drug trade the arms trade reaches profits from the commerce of death.
To make this code of conduct a reality may take some time, but humanity, my friends, cannot wait. The poor and the forsaken cannot wait. There is no time to delay. We know that with a fraction of the resources now dedicated to weapon procurement it would be possible to resolve the most serious problems of health, education, hunger and housing which afflict the world and within a reasonable time period. We must use our wisdom to form an alliance of global citizens against the arms trade. Our sword will be our dedication and will; our shield will be our solidarity. Let us win this struggle to regulate arms transfers for if we are not it's victors we will certainly be its victims."
Statement by His Holiness The Dalai Lama
"Some time ago, in Berlin, I was told this idea (Code of Conduct). I full heartedly supported it, and now I am very very happy that the idea materialized, and also, that many Nobel Laureates fully support it. So, I think it's very encouraging. Also, it seems many young people also responding with great enthusiasm. This is very encouraging. Now this is not enough&emdash;just enthusiasm. You must carry responsibility to materialize effectively about this idea. My part as a simple Buddhist monk, I try to promote peace and try to reduce violence. Here, I think everybody has clear hope and desire for genuine, lasting world peace at the international level, the national level, or even family level. Even, I think, individual level. I think everybody wants peace because peace gives us happiness. Violence and destruction gives us more suffering. So, therefore, in order to achieve genuine lasting world peace, I always emphasize there should be two kinds of disarmament. One internal disarmament. One external disarmament.
Now this (Code of Conduct) is very important as a first step of external disarmament, and also goes with internal disarmament. We are proceeding to reduce weapons and restrictions of arms trade, and then eventually complete disarmament on a global level. In the mean time, in family and in the various educational institutions we have to make every effort to carry internal disarmament. Try to make clear, what is the use of anger, and what is the use of hatred? Problems will always be there. It is wrong to expect a world without problems, that is unrealistic. Problems bound to happen, but we must find a way to work on these problems without using violence. I often tell people, our 20th century is a century of violence now we have to make the 21st century a century of dialogue.
So now everybody who is here, and especially the young people, and also the media I think people can get this idea. Please try to make a contribution. From each of us, with such effort, then there is a real possibility of transformation of humanity."
Statement by Dr. Elie Weisel
"Why are we here? We are here to fight death. We are here to celebrate those who want to live, who want to respect life. Those of you young people who have a future. We would like to celebrate your future. And so the time has come to introduce some ethical concerns in foreign policy matters. That is why we are here. For that is the primary goal of our endeavor. Great powers must be made clear that selling weapons indiscriminately may bring them businesses, contacts, checks, but not honor.
Weapons, sophisticated weapons, especially in this time of advanced technology, can easily become instruments of large scale destruction and death. Not for soldiers on battle fields but for innocent civilian children. Usually adults fight and children die. Usually adults hate one another and children pay the price for their hatred. Usually adults do whatever they can to make war and therefore soon, if wars continue, there will be no more children left. The idea that only democracies are worthy of their trust, I mean, of the trust of those who sell weapons if they must sell weapons, that idea is not founded. Democracies do not wage war against one another only dictatorships do. Only rulers, cynical rulers, who believe in conquests, who believe that whatever they do must be translated in terms of conquests only they want arms and they must want the arms bought from democracies."
"Why The United States, has in the past chosen to sell weapons to military dictators in Latin America is something I cannot understand. Was it then, is it now in the national interest of any great power to stake any risk of freedom in the third world? I believe that morality is in the national interest of any power that wants to be great. Great powers are not great only because they are wealthy or because they have great armies, but because they have great principles. Principles of morality even if at times in Machiavellian motions they do things that don't always conform to those principles, but the principles must exists in most cases."
"The Cold War is over. There won't be any war now. No war in the traditional sense between two peoples, now there are civil wars and nations who suppress other communities, and one example is Tibet. Why we must remind China, which could, because of it's size, of it's importance, and because of the metamorphosis it goes through, could actually afford giving back Tibet to the Tibetans.
Why the obstinacy of dictators? Why the Burmese dictators are so obstinant, so stupid? Because dictators are stupid. Why do they keep a great woman, a hero of our time, Aung San Suu Kyi, in house arrest? Why do they do that, they can only lose. They always lose."
"Wars are fed on weapons, so the only thing to do is stop the feeding, and that will relinquish or at least curtail. So I know that all this, what we are trying to do sounds utopian, I know this very well, but so what."
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PO Box 194 Fishers, Indiana 46038-0194 United States
e-mail: rangzen@aol.com
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