Vatican sidelined

Churches commitment for the ATT was strong. The last week WCC joint appeal reminded all that saving human lives is the most visible and concrete aim of the ATT.  And saving human lives is the reason why the Holy See – which has always been committed to policies and negotiations for disarmament – decided to take part in the drafting of the ATT.  In the end, the Treaty is the «least bad» solution, a hurdle on the path to integral disarmament, which is the great utopian ideal of the Church. A «utopian ideal» that is not an unreachable goal: on the basis of the Social Doctrine of the Church and comprehensive human development, step by step, the Holy See’s diplomatic engagement has been able to achieve important milestones.  It is a path toward the «disarmament of the heart», the necessary pre-condition to reach full disarmament. In fact, Holy See did not have such a considerable weight in the U.N. conference, because of a tense debate over the seating of a Palestinian representative, which was fiercely opposed by Israel and the US. The Palestinian Liberation Organization has observer status at the UN, as does the Holy See. The dispute was eventually resolved when both Palestinian and Vatican delegates agreed to accept lesser status, making them able to participate in the discussions, but not as recognized members.

ATT, a least bad solution

That the ATT is for the Catholic Church the lesser evil solution is clear in the speeches that Francis Chullikat, Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, addressed to the Fourth Session of the Preparatory Committee for the United Nations Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty, last February 13^th.  One of the reasons why the Holy See is a permanent observer – and not a full member – of the United Nations lies on decisions taken on sessions like this.  As a full member, the Holy See would be obliged to vote, and its vote could be politically manipulated.  As a permanent observer, the Holy See maintains its super partes prerogatives, and at the same time has a considerable diplomatic impact.  The Holy See’s main objective is not to have arms considered an «economic good» like any other.

ATT, five Vatican points

Chullikat’s intervention at the committee comprised five points.  First, the scope of the ATT, which should be broad, «comprising not solely the 7 categories of arms which the U.N. Register of Conventional Arms considers, but also small arms and light weapons, together with their relevant munitions, which enter the illicit market often with greater ease and give rise to a series of humanitarian problems».   Second, the request that the Treaty refer to human rights, humanitarian law and development.  At the same time, Chullikat affirms that it is «necessary to find terminology which limits subjective possibilities open to political abuse, and which will facilitate the ascertainment of modalities for application of such criteria».

Chullikat admonished that «the success of the Treaty will depend also on its ability to promote and reinforce international co-operation and assistance between States»; underlined that «provisions relating to assistance for victims must be maintained, and if possible, strengthened, giving attention also to the prevention of illicit arms proliferation, by reducing the demand for arms which often feeds the illicit market». And: «It seems opportune, from this perspective, then, to introduce references in the Treaty to educative processes and public awareness programmes – involving all sectors of society, including religious organizations – that are aimed at promoting a culture of peace.» Finally – Chullikat said – «mechanisms for treaty review and updating need to be strong and credible, capable of quickly incorporating new developments in the subject matter of the ATT, which must remain open to future technological developments. »

On his last interventions to the negotiations in New York, Chullikat re-underlined these five points, remembering that «the ATT debate gave us the opportunity to point out once again the pernicious impact of the illicit arms trade on development, peace, humanitarian law and human rights. Arms cannot simply be compared with other goods exchanged in global or domestic markets. They need a specialised regulation, one capable of preventing, combating and eradicating the irresponsible and illicit trade of conventional arms and related items». Chullikat also said that «this effort calls for the involvement of all members of the international community: States and international organizations, NGOs and the private sector. All of them are responsible for promoting an interrelated action aimed at the “establishment and maintenance of international peace and security with the least diversion for armaments of the world’s human and economic resources” (cfr. Art. 26 of the UN Charter) ».

Arms are not a conventional economic good

The Chullikat’s five points are part of a well defined program.  On the one hand, the five points underline the need to diminish the demand for an arms market, favoring peace and education processes instead. In this sense, the Holy See supports the proposal not to allow the issuance of patents to inventions that can be dangerous to human beings.  This would make arms production unprofitable, and thus a strong deterrent to the invention and manufacturing of new arms and a good means to get to full disarmament.

On the other hand, it is obvious that favoring peace and education processes means that the Holy See wants more attention paid to people’s development («The new name of peace is development», Paul VI wrote in the encyclical Populorum Progressio in 1967) and to favor the greatest degree possible of multilateral diplomacy, in order to take into account the needs of all countries – even the smallest ones (several times the Holy See has criticized the G-meetings – G8, G20 – and advocated for a reform of the United Nations).  It is to protect the poorest countries that the Holy See requested that the Arms Trade Treaty include all arms – and not just the types included in the United Nations Register –in illicit traffic prevention efforts.

Until now, the Holy See was alone in the fight to broaden the Treaty.  Only recently the United Kingdom – at the end of the visit of the delegation sent by Prime Minister Cameron to celebrate 30 years of diplomatic relations between the United Kingdom and the Holy See – joined the Holy See in this effort. And then also Mexico – during the Papal trip – backed the Holy See positions at the ATT negotiations.

An “intellectual” and economical struggle

The Holy See’s position on disarmament impinges upon, in a very particular way, the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights. TRIP is an international agreement administered by the World Trade Organization (WTO) that sets minimum standards for mutual recognition of many forms of intellectual property among member states.  It was negotiated at the end of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in 1994. Article 27.2 of TRIP allows States to withhold patents on inventions which application could threaten public order or human life or health.

Not to patent weapons inventions would make the development of arms less attractive to industries, and States may be less interested in producing and trading them.  The risk that technological and scientific progress may be used to elude international regulations on disarmament and arms control, or as a means of economic and military hegemony, remains.  Highly developed countries could claim that sophisticated – so called “intelligent” – arms are compatible with disarmament and arms control regulations, and with international human rights. This could lead to a controversial scenario: only the arms held by less developed countries – not as sophisticated – would be incompatible with regulations, i.e. illicit.   Another problematic area relates to the development of genetically modified biological weapons, or bio-technological military applications, were rich countries would also have the competitive advantage.

Economic-financial issues always press on. The «civilian» economy tends to overlap with military-driven technological advancements and spending.  Much of the concerns of the Holy See have been on dual use, i.e. on the possibility that that the same good could be used for both civil and military purposes. There is a need for clarity, since «dual use» technology can bring confusion to trade regimes unable or unwilling to properly distinguish between the civilian and military applications of a product.

These are some of the key points of the Holy See’s diplomatic engagement on disarmament.  The Holy See acknowledges there have been positive developments on disarmament and arms control, and closely monitored the negotiations at the United Nations.  The Holy See is also aware that UN negotiations can always get «stuck» because of the resistance of particularly influential States – as happened in the last U.N. conference. But there are also some encouraging developments, like the adoption of the Anti-Personnel Landmines Convention and the Cluster Munitions Convention – conventions adopted out of the context of the Conferences on disarmament.

A new diplomacy reveals that not only States are interested in disarmament

This model for new diplomatic activity shows the application of the Social Doctrine of the Church and the merits of the principle of subsidiariaty. It reveals that not only States, through traditional diplomatic channels, are interested in disarmament. This new diplomacy can also be very appealing to Non Governmental Organizations. Diplomacy inspired by religious belief – it is worth noting – should not be undervalued.  In the past, documents like the Pastoral Letter on War and Peace. The Challenge of Peace: God’s promise and our response, released by US bishops in 1983, contributed significantly to the debate on arms control, despite Cold War proliferation dynamics. More recently, bishops’ conferences of Scotland, England and Wales campaigned against the renewal of Great Britain’s Trident nuclear system.

More broadly, the fruits of the Holy See’s diplomatic work are like gems shining in many international documents. For example, the right to assistance for cluster munitions victims was included in the Cluster Munitions Convention thanks to the Holy See’s relentless efforts during the Convention’s drafting in Dublin in 2008 (the Convention was signed in Oslo that same year).

Building upon this history of engagement, the Holy See worked on the ATT in New York, and will keep on working on the new talks on this issue.  Reaffirming the perspective of the Social Doctrine of the Church, the Holy See upholds the centrality of the human person. This approach perhaps makes disarmament an even greater challenge.  It is, however, an approach that is about the healing of the heart and thus sets a path more conducive to full disarmament and the common good.

This is why the Pope steers clear from polemics. Only at the previous general audience, Benedict XVI used the occasion to take a stand against the attacks to his closest collaborators.  At the end of the audience he renewed his trust in them with a precise and straightforward declaration, underlining keywords with his own voice. The latest attacks have been increasingly vague on the Vatileaks issue and the arrest of the butler Paolo Gabriele, and ever more focused on the Works’ Institute (IOR) issue and on the ousting of its former president Gotti Tedeschi.  Tedeschi has been spinning the controversy with his innuendoes, his responses to the magistrates of Rome questioning him as part of an ill-defined investigation, and with the IOR files seized by the Italian public prosecutor of Naples. The Pope responded to all of these  developments, controversies and media attention with a catechesis on a general audience.  As part of the cycle of the catechesis on prayer, the audience was dedicated to prayer in the life of the apostle Paul. The Pope recalls: «Defending the legitimacy of his apostolate, Paul looks up, above all, to his profound closeness to the Lord in prayer, marked by moments of ecstasy, visions and revelations (cf. 2 Cor 12:1ff.). Yet he speaks too of a trial which the Lord sent him lest he become conceited: a mysterious thorn in the flesh (v. 7). Paul therefore willingly boasts of his weakness, in order that the power of Christ might dwell in him (v. 10). Through this experience of mystical prayer, Paul realized that God’s Kingdom comes about not by our own efforts but by the power of God’s grace shining through our poor earthen vessels (cf. 2 Cor 4:7)».

The message of the Pope is that it is not man’s perfection that makes the Church. It is on the contrary the weakness of man that characterizes it. If the Church is still here, it is not because of the men and women that are part of it, but by the grace of God. The call to simply follow the gospel points to a fundamental change coming about under Benedict XVI. The Pope chose his collaborators on the basis of personal knowledge and trust. But their role, the responsibility they are charged with, the «image» they project as Papal collaborators, must not overshadow that of the Church as a whole. In the past, everybody knew Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Secretary of State, while the work of Vatican diplomacy was less known. Now, the Secretary of State, Cardinal Bertone, is receiving a lot of attention, because of  the internal resistance to him and his new course. Yet, Vatican diplomacy is more important than the Secretary of State. At an international level, the Holy See has proposed a World Authority with universal competence. During the Preparatory Commission for a new ATT (Arms Trade Treaty), the Holy See proposed to broaden the ATT to small arms and light weapons, going beyond the seven categories in the U.N. register of arms. The Holy See also supported denying patents to inventions that would damage human beings. Equally important is the Holy See position paper for the Preparatory Commission of the U.N. conference on the environment, Rio+20, where it calls for «a new model of development» and underlined that sustainable development is part of comprehensive human development – one of the key words of the “change of dictionary” for the United Nations, described by Silvano Maria Tomasi, Papal nuncio to the Geneva office of  the United Nations.

Another example of the change of an era is in the profile of the personal secretary of the Pope.  Stanislao Dziwisz – now cardinal and archbishop of Cracow – was in a center stage role.  Georg Gaenswein has been under attack by the leaks, but he has always kept a low profile, fulfilling his duties with discretion.

Many – inside the Vatican – did not welcome this change to a new era.

It is the end of personalism, evident also in the no confidence vote by the “lay” board of the IOR to the president of the board Gotti Tedeschi. He did not get a no confidence vote because of the policy of transparency – that the Holy See is implementing with tenacity and commitment, adhering to international standards – but because the board did not considered him able to lead the institute. His media activism – this is one of the accusations levied against him – was missing when the IOR needed to be defended. The memo of the no confidence vote has been (almost institutionally) released. And the general manager of the IOR, Paolo Cipriani, talked about what the Institute has been doing in terms of transparency during the last years. The facts are public, and there is not much more to say.

The final goal is the integral disarmament. The path to reach it is the human integral development. And the diplomatic impact is a necessary tool in order to let all the countries be conscious of the need to gain the integral human development, as well as they need to gain an international multilateral policy brought to the common good.

This underlined Francis Assisi Chullikat, permanent observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, in his address to the Fourth Session of the Preparatory Committee for the United Nations Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty, the last February, 13^th. One of the reasons why the Holy See is Permanent Observer – and not Full Member – to the United Nations Assembly resides in its participations to these sessions. As a Full Member, the Holy See would be obliged to vote, and its vote could be politically used. As a Permanent Observer, the Holy See maintain its super partes prerogatives, and at the same time it can have a considerable diplomatic impact.

In his speech, Chullikat underlined five aspects. First, the scope of the ATT, that – according to the Holy See – should be broad, «comprising not solely the 7 categories of arms which the U.N. Register of Conventional Arms considers, but also small arms and light weapons, together with their relevant munitions, which enter the illicit market often with greater ease and give rise to a series of humanitarian problems». Second, the request that the criteria for application of the treaty maintain reference to human rights, humanitarian law and development. At the same time, Chullikat affirms that it is «necessary to find terminology which limits subjective possibilities open to political abuse, and which will facilitate the ascertainment of modalities for application of such criteria». And then, Chullikat admonished that «the capacity for the success of the Treaty will depend also on its ability to promote and reinforce international co-operation and assistance between States»; underlined that «provisions relating to assistance for victims must be maintained, and if possible, strengthened, giving attention also to the prevention of illicit arms proliferation, by reducing the demand for arms which often feeds the illicit market». More: «It seems opportune, from this perspective, then, to introduce references in the Treaty to educative processes and public awareness programmes – involving all sectors of society, including religious organisations – that are aimed at promoting a culture of peace»; finally – Chullikat said – «mechanisms for treaty review and updating need to be strong and credible, capable of quickly incorporating new developments in the subject matter of the ATT, which must remain open to future technological developments».

These five aspects are part of a well defined program. On one side, the need to diminish the demand for the arms market, favoring the peace and education processes. In this sense, Holy See internationally sustained the proposal not to patent inventions that can be dangerous for human being. This lack of patenting would make the arm production unprofitable, and could be a strong deterrent in the fabrication and invention of new arms and a good tool to get to the integral disarmament.

On the other side, it is obvious that favoring peace and education processes means that Holy See is to pay more attention to the people’s development («The new name of peace is development», Paul VI wrote in the encyclical letter Populorum Progressio in 1967) and to develop the most possible multilateral diplomacy, in order to take into consideration the need of all the countries – even the smallest ones (several times Holy See criticized the G-meetings – G8, G20 – and auspicated a reform of the United Nations). It is to defend the poorest countries that Holy See requested to frame the Arms Trade Treat in order to protect all the arms – and not the restricted group considered in the United Nations Register – from the illicit traffic. An illicit traffic that – in case of war – would favor the richest countries and would disadvantage the poorest countries.

The final draft of the document will be in July. But, until now, Holy See brought on an almost solitary fight to broad the Treaty, even if recently United Kingdom – at the end of the visit of the Delegation sent by Cameron administration to celebrate the 30 years of diplomatic relations between United Kingdom and Holy See – backed Holy See in its effort.

And also Mexico is now officially backing Holy See effort. Organized crime  also cherishes from the  black marketeering  of the small weapons. And the fight to the organized crime – that cause about 60 thousand victims a year -  i.e. the narcoguerra launched a couple of years ago by president Calderon, is topical in Mexico. So, in July Holy See will be able to count on the backing of United Kingdom and Mexico for the ATT. Hopefully, other countries will back Holy See’s effort, and another brick will be put in the wall of peace.