A/HRC/35/8 rights abuses by another State, the particular circumstances of each case must be carefully examined to determine whether the aiding State by its aid was aware of and intended to facilitate the commission of the internationally wrongful conduct. B. Arms transfer regimes 23. States have taken steps to regulate arms transfers through a variety of binding and non-binding instruments at the international and regional levels. These instruments make human rights a primary consideration for States when assessing the lawfulness of a potential arms transfer. 1. Arms Trade Treaty 24. The Arms Trade Treaty is the first international, legally binding instrument to govern specifically the transfer of conventional arms, their key parts and components and ammunition/munitions, and to incorporate human rights as a standard to restrict such transfers, with the express purpose of reducing human suffering. An important feature of the Treaty is to make respect for and protection of human rights imperative in any determination of whether a proposed arms transfer should proceed. In the preamble of the Treaty, the signatories acknowledged “the security, social, economic and humanitarian consequences of the illicit and unregulated trade in conventional arms” and recalled that “civilians, particularly women and children, account for the vast majority of those affected by armed conflict and armed violence”. Moreover, the Treaty explicitly incorporates in its preamble the principle, already set out in the Charter of the United Nations, of “the least diversion for armaments of the world’s human and economic resources”, thereby acknowledging that an increase in arms expenditure diverts resources from health, education and other social sector spending. 25. Articles 6, 7 and 8 constitute the key provisions of the Arms Trade Treaty. Such is the significance of articles 6 and 7 that signatory or ratifying States may declare that they will provisionally apply them, pending the entry into force of the Treaty. Article 6 (3) prohibits, in absolute terms, any transfer of conventional arms when the State party has knowledge, at the time of authorization, that the arms would be used in the commission of genocide, crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 1949, attacks directed against civilian objects or civilians protected as such, or other war crimes as defined by international agreements to which it is a party. A transfer of arms in violation of Security Council arms embargoes or other international obligations is also prohibited. 26. When a proposed export is not prohibited under article 6, the exporting State must still assess, “in an objective and non-discriminatory way”, the “potential” that the weapons would contribute to, or undermine, peace and security, and that they could be used to commit or facilitate offences under international conventions related to terrorism and transnational organized crime or a serious violation of international human rights law or international humanitarian law (art. 7). Article 7 (4) explicitly provides that the exporting State must take into account the risk of the potential export items being used to commit or facilitate serious acts of gender-based violence or serious acts of violence against women and children. Arms export decisions in relation to any and every export of conventional arms, parts and components or ammunitions/munitions covered by the Arms Trade Treaty are therefore subject to a human rights risk assessment. 27. The text of the Arms Trade Treaty does not define which acts constitute “a serious violation of international human rights law”. In that regard, the criteria most commonly used in evaluating the seriousness of human rights violations, as evidenced by the practice of United Nations human rights mechanisms and other relevant international and regional bodies, include the character of the right violated, the nature or scale of the violation, the impact of the violation and the type of victim. 46 46 8 Geneva Academy of International humanitarian Law and Human Rights, “What amounts to ‘a serious violation of international human rights law’? An analysis of practice and expert opinion for the