A/HRC/7/7 page 24 perspective of the current practices of private military and security companies recruiting personnel to be deployed in armed conflict and to review steps taken by States to regulate and monitor the activities of PMSCs. It will also attempt to develop regulatory options and best practices aimed at ensuring that PMSC activities are in conformity with international human rights standards. 55. This informative consultation will be used as a first step in view of the proposal recommended by the Working Group to convene a high-level round table to discuss the fundamental role of the State as holder of the monopoly of the use of force. The Working Group intends, if the necessary resources are available, to conduct two additional governmental consultations during 2008 and two more in 2009, similar to the one to be held for the Latin American and Caribbean Region in Panama, in order to present to the high-level round table of States, to be convened under the auspices of the United Nations, a global perception of the emerging issues, manifestations and trends regarding mercenary-related activities and their impact on human rights which will contain the regional views of the States of the five regions. VI. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 56. In the course of 2006 and 2007, the Working Group has monitored the activities of private companies offering military assistance, consultancy and security services at the international level. It has conducted field missions to Chile, Ecuador, Fiji, Honduras and Peru which have permitted it to identify how PMSCs recruit, train, use or finance former military personnel and ex-policemen to operate in armed conflict or highly dangerous post-conflict situations. It has also studied emerging issues, manifestations and trends regarding mercenaries or mercenary-related activities and their impact on human rights. On the basis of this information, it is of the opinion that many of such manifestations are new modalities of mercenary-related activities. 57. The proliferation of PMSCs in the world is a direct consequence of the outsourcing and privatization by member States of many military and security functions. A large number of these companies are the supply side for contracts granted by the Department of Defense or the State Department of the United States of America in connection with low-intensity armed conflicts or post-conflict situations such as in Afghanistan, Colombia and Iraq. To implement their contracts and at the same time make the most lucrative profits, some of these transnational companies, through subsidiaries or hiring companies, create, stimulate and fuel the demand in developing countries. Former military personnel and ex-policemen are recruited as “security guards”, but once in low-intensity armed conflicts or post-conflict situations, they become in fact private soldiers militarily armed. Provisions in national legislations granting immunity to PMSC personnel can easily become de facto impunity, with these private soldiers being only accountable to the company employing them. Some Governments appear to consider these individuals as