A quick guide to using the new Control Arms ‘World is Watching’ materials
2008 is a crucial year for the global Arms Trade Treaty (ATT). 28 experts are taking part in discussions at the UN on the scope of the proposed ATT. We need to keep the pressure on all governments, to make sure they deliver an effective treaty that saves lives and makes people safer from armed violence.
To help do this, Control Arms has developed some new materials on the theme of ‘The World is Watching’. We want to send a message to governments that the ATT is important to millions of people all around the world, and that these people will be keeping a close eye on their leaders, to make sure they agree a strong treaty.
The materials are available in Arabic, English, French, Portuguese and Spanish. There’s an action card, a poster and a sticker. The images and fonts are also available if you wish to use these to develop specific materials for your country.
Over the next few months, we’ll be focusing a lot of our campaigning on parliamentarians. Over 1000 parliamentarians have signed our Control Arms parliamentarian’s declaration on the ATT, and we’re aiming for 3000 signatures in time for the UN First Committee this October.
How to use the action card
The new action card gives people a way to send a message to their parliamentarian, to tell them to sign the Control Arms declaration. The card is in three sections:
• one gives people some background information about the campaign
• the middle part is to allow you to collect the names and contact details of people who have signed up to the campaign, so that you can contact them in future about other actions
• the third part is for people to sign and send to their parliamentarian
The best way to use to card is to ask people to sign it and return it to you. You can then send them to the relevant parliamentarians, or send them to the head of the parliament, or the leaders of the main parties in parliament. You could do this in a handover event at the parliament.
Ideas for further action
The ‘World is Watching’ theme can also be used in events and press work on the ATT during the week of action and beyond. Some ideas are listed below:
• a group of people standing outside parliament / the Ministry of Foreign Affairs / the embassies of GGE countries all wearing glasses or holding up binoculars with a ‘World is Watching’ banner
• putting glasses on statues, again with a poster or banner
• creating ‘giant’ glasses or a magnifying glass
Please take photos of your actions and send them to us at bruce.millar@iansa.org
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