The U.S. Goal Is to Ensure the PoA Continues To Do Nothing

U.S. Goals at the 2018 Review Conference of the U.N.’s Programme of Action on Small Arms, Heritage Foundation Backgrounder #3313, May 14, 2018. "The U.N.’s Programme of Action to Prevent, Combat, and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects (PoA) is a political mechanism, which works by unanimous consensus for encouraging voluntary cooperation against the illicit small-arms trade. It is a substantive failure, but that is unlikely to stop the PoA’s forthcoming Third Review Conference from seeking to expand the PoA in unproductive ways—including by advocating an unworkable plan for the registry of individual rounds of ammunition and supporting new technical requirements for civilian firearms. If the U.S. continues to participate in the PoA, it should send a strong delegation to the Conference to effectively oppose these ideas. Likewise, the U.S. should staunchly reject all efforts to transform the PoA into a treaty and not be taken in by Trojan Horse strategies designed to impose constraining international norms on the U.S."