Stephen Williams MP backs Million Faces campaign

2.54.26pm BST (GMT +0100) Fri 12th May 2006

Stephen Williams MP protests outside the Oxfam Shop on Park Street with local activists Sarah Lever and Liz Bennett.

Liberal Democrat MP for Bristol West, Stephen Williams, met this week with Bristol activists from both Amnesty International and Oxfam to support their Million Faces Campaign which calls on countries around the world to limit the sale of small arms.

The campaign aims to collect a million photographs and portraits of ordinary people by the time the United Nations meets to discuss the issue in June. There are around 639 million small arms and light weapons in the world today. Eight million more are produced every year. Without strict control, the campaign argues, such weapons will continue to fuel violent conflict, state repression, crime, and domestic abuse.

Stephen Williams said "For too long the British government have hidden behind the idea that if Britain does not supply weapons to anyone who wants them then somebody else will. This argument ignores the moral responsibility we have to limit the existence of such machines. The AK-47 revolutionised the field of mass murder, allowing anyone - even a child - to become a soldier over night. The sooner that international action is taken to restrict the availability of these weapons, the better."

Mr Williams met members of Amnesty International on Wednesday at the House of Commons, followed by members of Oxfam on Friday at their shop on Park Street.

For more information about the Million Faces campaign visit www.controlarms.org