Drones and Arms Control Manish I

Regulations in a country are often governed by the question whether the country favours the promotion of new technology or a safety-first approach.10 The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the United Nations’ aviation agency is the lead platform in the international sphere of governance of drones. [...] The proliferation issue is at the forefront of the debate since there is concern that proliferation of armed drones can result in a rise in armed conflict as well as the possibility that drones could end up in the wrong hands.13 The sheer scale of the drone industry and the related commerce is one of the factors that either has an impact on the MTCR or represents a challenge for it in relation to. [...] Some of India’s early disarmament initiatives at the United Nations, include the call for a “nuclear stand-still accord” and a ban on nuclear testing.32 At the 1965 session of the UN General Assembly, India, as the lead co-sponsor, introduced the resolution A/ RES/2028(XX), on 19 November 1965, calling upon the “Conference of the Eighteen-Nation Committee on Disarmament” to give urgent considerati. [...] The second was the nuclear test by the People’s Republic of China in 1964 and its acceptance as a de jure nuclear weapon state in the context of the NPT (the NPT defines a nuclear weapon state as one that tested a device before January 1967), though at that point, the People’s Republic of China neither occupied the Chinese seat in the UN nor was it a party to the NPT. [...] In this regard, the essential lessons from the East-West confrontation era should be recalled: on one hand, the negative lessons learned and hazards that originated from the arms race and the potential for military escalation, and on the other, the stabilising value and mutual benefit of cooperative arms and export controls.