facilitate facilitate unlawful killings, torture or other cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment or punishment, or other human rights violations or abuses.
Establish lists of prohibited and controlled less lethal weapons and equipment
which must be regularly reviewed and updated to take account of new data and
technological developments.
Establish a comprehensive national trade control system to vet prospective
transfers of controlled equipment. Decisions to grant export authorisations for
controlled law enforcement equipment should be made on a case-by-case basis
by the competent authority in the State where the applicant is based. If there is a
substantial risk that the less lethal weapons and equipment would be used for
prohibited purposes by the recipient law-enforcement authority, or be diverted
to another unauthorised end-user, States should not authorise the transfer.
To evaluate licence applications, the authority should take into account relevant
information derived from UN and regional human rights monitors and respected
NGOs, relating to the activities of the proposed law enforcement end users, in
particular their compliance with human rights law and standards and their
reported use, misuse and regulation of law enforcement equipment. States must
regularly review export licences; in the event of the emergence of any substantial
risk of misuse, States must immediately suspend licences pending further review.
Inform their legislature and share information with other States about measures
taken to regulate the trade in less lethal weapons and law enforcement
equipment. They should publish an annual report in a manner containing
meaningful information on the volume, value, nature of such less lethal weapons
and equipment, and destination of their trade in this area, so as to enable
appropriate oversight by elected representatives and independent bodies. States
should notify their legislature of all decisions approving or rejecting a request
for an export authorisation and of any decisions rescinding an export
authorisation that has already been granted, along with the reasons for each
decision.
Establishing effective national measures to regulate the trade in less lethal weapons and
other law enforcement equipment, though vital, will not be sufficient to ensure that law
enforcement agencies engaged in human rights violations including torture and other
ill-treatment do not continue to receive less lethal weapons and law enforcement
equipment from unscrupulous exporters in other countries. To combat such activities,
inter-governmental organizations should establish regional, and eventually
international, standards and instruments regulating trade in this area. All States
should join the Alliance for Torture Free Trade, endorse its Political Declaration and
work to promote a UN process to establish international controls in this area.
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