New York –  Nigeria’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Prof. Joy Ogwu, has been appointed the Chairperson of  the UN Review Conference of the Programme of Action (UN-PoA) on Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALWS).

The review conference is scheduled to hold from Aug. 27 to Sept. 7.

Ogwu was elected pursuant to UN Resolution 65/64 of Dec. 8, 2010 as Chair-Designate in May, 2011.

Ogwu is also to chair a five-day preparatory Committee Meeting, known in UN circles as  PrepCom, which will hold from March 19 to 27.

Member states of the UN adopted the Programme of Action in July 2001 with an additional mandate to conduct its first review in 2006.

The conference is necessitated by a deep concern over illicit transfer, manufacture and circulation of SALWS and their excessive accumulation and uncontrolled spread in many regions of the world.

A source, who preferred anonymity, said that the two-week session in 2006 could not reach  substantive agreements for several reasons, among them the inability of countries to extract  minimum outcomes from the Review Conference.

Ogwu will be carrying the weight of Nigeria, ECOWAS, Africa and indeed the entire world, as she treads the sensitive terrain during the months leading to the Review Conference in August.

As a leading African member-state at the UN, Nigeria has been active in the efforts to stem the wave of illicit transfer, manufacture, accumulation and indiscriminate use of small arms and light weapons. (NAN)