Brian Bradley
NS&D Monitor
3/13/2015
Interest in the Conference on Disarmament has waned in recent years as progress on disarmament issues has stagnated, and one of the last remaining observers of the forum is calling it quits. The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) and its disarmament programme Reaching Critical Will said this week that it will effectively cut ties with the Conference on Disarmament, citing sexist remarks and stagnant disarmament discussions in the U.N. body. “This is the only time of year that any voice from civil society is allowed inside the CD chamber,” the letter reads. “And this may be the last time our voice is heard here.”
The letter goes on to detail the CD’s lack of substantive engagement in the last 17 years because of a minority of states that have blocked negotiations, and the limited access to live conference sessions. All agreements in the CD must be made through consensus. “And yet many of the other members refuse to allow a change in working methods, rules of procedure, enlargement of membership, or engagement of civil society,” the letter states. Progress on a Fissile Material Cut-Off Treaty halted in 2010, when Pakistan blocked negotiations on such an agreement.
The letter also cites sexist language spoken during a Feb. 11 session, when a Belarusian delegate warned the CD about “topless ladies throwing bottles of mayonnaise” if forums were opened to the public. The words were spoken during a debate spurred by a WILPF proposal to increase its access and engagement to the CD. Amb. Jorge Lomónaco, Permanent Representative of Mexico to the UN’s Geneva Office, tabled the draft decision to increase the organization’s access. “Many of you have expressed your appreciation for our work over and over again,” the letter states. “And we do enjoy working with you towards our collective goals. But at the moment that it mattered, some of you put process over progress. Member states that pride themselves to be open, democratic societies said they needed more time, had some more questions, wanted some changes, and in the end could not agree to what from our perspective was smaller than the smallest common denominator. We in WILPF have thus decided that it’s finally time to cease our engagement with this body.”
