UN team says small arms threat is serious

A UN fact-finding mission on small arms on Friday wound up its investigation in Kenya, concluding that small arms have become much more destructive to the east African country. Small arms were now easily accessible in Kenya and had greatly contributed to the deterioration of security in the country, Joao Honwana, head of the mission, told a press conference in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, on Friday. Investigations had shown that these arms were arriving in Kenya mainly from neighbouring Somalia, Sudan and Ethiopia, and that the problem could not therefore be tackled in Kenya alone, news reports quoted him as saying. “We need to identify concrete areas where interventions are possible, effective and useful,” he added.

Junior Minister at the Department of Foreign Affairs Sheldon Muchilwa told journalists that the government had made several proposals to the mission team, including that the UN should devote more effort to resolving the sub-regional conflicts which created a climate in which arms were freely available and arms trafficking proliferated. Muchilwa also called for the creation of protected ‘safe havens’ within the countries at conflict in order to stem refugee flows and allow Kenya to stem the flow of illicit arms, news organisations reported.