The United Nations is “on a collision course” with the U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment and the natural right of all people to defend themselves,” the Second Amendment Foundation said today in a statement to the U.N.’s Programme of Action (POA) meeting in New York.
SAF Operations Director Julianne Versnel told the committee that “the POA and other UN efforts repeatedly and vociferously discuss gender issues.”
“They acknowledge that women are disproportionally the victims of horrendous violence, sometimes even perpetrated by their own governments or others in power,” Versnel said. “Yet, they turn a blind eye to the reality that women have a right to defend themselves and are capable of doing so. The Programme of Action seems unable to acknowledge anything beyond the simplistic notion that civilian firearms are inherently evil. The right of women, indeed the right of men and women, to self-defense is a human right.”
The U.N. has failed to recognize this human right, she stated, whether it deals with POA activities, the infamous Arms Trade Treaty or even its own Human Rights Council.
“This is not a geographically limited issue and a growing number of organizations consider it vital,” she said. “In fact, the Second Amendment Foundation along 20 other civilian firearms rights groups from six continents came together in 2008 to form the International Association for the Protection of Civilian Arms (IAPCAR). IAPCAR intends to vigorously pursue the right to self-defense in every possible venue.”
Versnel criticized a 2006 report by Barbara Frey with the UN Human Rights Council that “refused the idea that there is a right to have arms for self-defense and furthermore rejected any concept of self-defense as a human right. It also went on to say that states had a duty to engage in gun control. The kind of gun controls makes self-defense impossible.”
Frey’s report was titled Prevention of Human Rights Violations Committed with Small Arms and Light Weapons.
“These conclusions were outrageous,” Versnel stated. “These erroneous concepts have spread at the UN. It appears that Peru introduced a resolution at the UN Human Rights Council, based on the Frey report that, in essence, demanded that all states institute strict civilian gun control. NGOs are starting to base their opposition to firearms on the Frey report at the expense of recognizing an individual’s right to self-defense.”
While acknowledging that the question cannot be resolved quickly, Versnel promised to “debate this in any venue, at any time, at any place.”
