Many micro-disarmament actions could be included in development cooperation projects, both at bilateral and multilateral level. The UNDP is also involved. Such projects need to be extended to include demobilisation operations, weapons collection and destruction, border surveillance, training and restructuring of security forces and international cooperation. Moreover, international agencies such as the World Bank, IMF and OECD are currently investigating ways of promoting a lessening of tension and the establishment of a safe and secure environment through a reduction in armaments, armed forces and military spending. Any discussion of this topic is complex because account has to be taken of very different situations, and of variable data relating to such matters as international and internal security, the level of development, respect for human rights and the existing political system.
Arms come from two main sources.
Then there is the huge second-hand arms market, based mainly in Russia and other countries in Eastern Europe. This market developed with the ending of the Cold War. There is currently no multilateral system for controlling or limiting conventional arms as there is for the nuclear, chemical, biological or ballistic weapons which are seen as the most dangerous. Yet, for several years, conventional armaments and, in particular, light weapons have proved the most lethal. There does, however, appear to be a growing awareness of the need for control.