The ECOWAS Secretariat on Tuesday announced that its Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) and other related materials were in force and fully operational.
It said nine member-states had already ratified the Convention.
General Seth Obeng (Rtd), Member of the Advisory Board of ECOWAS Small Arms Control Programme (ECOSAP) announced this at the inauguration of the Ghana Chapter of West Africa Action Network on Small Arms (WAANSA) in Accra.
The Convention seeks to prevent and combat the excessive and destabilising accumulation of small arms and light weapons within ECOWAS;
strengthen efforts for the control of SALW; and consolidate the gains of the declaration of the moratorium on the importation, exportation and
manufacture of small arms and its code of conduct.
The nine countries that have ratified the convention are Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo, Guinea and Liberia.
General Obeng said in view of its benefits to the sub-region, it was important that the remaining member-states quickened action on ratifying it.
He said attention was now being focused on Ghana, which had always played a front role in sub-regional initiatives, to speed up action on
ratifying the convention.
General Obeng commended WAANSA its collaborative efforts to ensure that
proliferation of SALW was curtailed.