The United States Should Withdraw from the U.N.’s Programme of Action on Small Arms Ted R. Bromund, PhDThe 2018 meeting of the U.N. Programme of Action (PoA) on the illicit trade in small arms broke both a U.S. red line and the PoA’s principle of unanimity. As its achievements are limited at best the only reason for the U.S. to participate in the PoA was to prevent it from making bad decisions and binding U.S. policy. Now that the PoA has abandoned unanimity, the U.S. should withdraw from, and discontinue any aid through, the PoA.
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In 2001, the United Nations created the Programme of Action to Prevent, Combat, and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects (PoA), commonly called the Programme of Action. The PoA is not a treaty; it is a political mechanism intended to work by unanimous consent for encouraging voluntary cooperation on
suppressing
the illicit arms trade. The PoA meetings result in an outcome document containing conclusions that, if unanimously agreed, are politically (though not legally) binding for all participants in the PoA. PoA meetings are held jointly with meetings of the International Tracing Instrument (ITI), created in 2005, which provides a framework for cooperation on small arms tracing.REF