Human Rights and the Civilian Acquisition, Possession and Use of Firearms

Calls upon States to do their utmost to take appropriate legislative, administrative and other measures, consistent with international law, in particular human rights law, and their constitutional frameworks, including comprehensive, inclusive and evidence-based public policies, tailored to address the root causes and risk factors driving firearms-related violence, including different forms of inequality and discrimination rooted in negative stereotypes, in order to minimize the human rights impact of the civilian acquisition, possession and use of firearms, with the aim of strengthening the protection and enjoyment of the human rights of all;

Also calls upon States to consider adopting requirements for manufacturers and dealers of firearms and their ammunition based on the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, which include the responsibility to avoid causing or contributing to adverse human rights impacts, preventing, remediating when appropriate or mitigating adverse human rights impacts that are directly linked to their operations, and the responsibility to conduct human rights due diligence;

Calls upon States to adopt effective national regulations and, where necessary, strengthen controls on the acquisition, possession and use of firearms and their ammunition by children, and to invest in and support community-based interventions aimed at violence prevention and rehabilitation of children and youth trapped in environments of violence, including those largely attributable to the illicit activities of organized criminal groups and street gangs;

Encourages States to collect and publish disaggregated data on the acquisition, possession and use of firearms and their ammunition, where feasible and consistent with their constitutional and legislative frameworks, and to analyse the underlying drivers of firearm use affecting the enjoyment of human rights;

Calls upon all States to take effective measures with the aim of implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, in particular Sustainable Development Goal 16, to promote peaceful and inclusive societies;

Requests the High Commissioner to prepare, in consultation with Member States, a report on the impact of the civilian acquisition, possession and use of firearms and the underlying root causes and risk factors driving firearms-related violence on the right to participate in cultural life and the right to take part in the conduct of public affairs, particularly for individuals in vulnerable or marginalized situations, and to present the report to the Human Rights Council at its fifty-ninth session;

Invites all relevant special procedures, commissions of inquiry and other accountability mechanisms, and human rights treaty bodies, as well as the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, to continue to bear in mind the present resolution within the framework of their respective mandates;

Invites all business enterprises, including those involved in the manufacture and sale of firearms and their ammunition, to consider the reports of the High Commissioner on human rights and the civilian acquisition, possession and use of firearms when addressing the adverse human rights impacts of their operations, in line with the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights;