Joint Civil Society Statement on Armed Drones, UN General Assembly First Committee 2026
Joint Civil Society Statement on Armed Drones
UN General Assembly First Committee on Disarmament and International Security 15 October 2026
Delivered by Caitlin Travers (Article 36) on behalf of
85 civil society organisations and coalitions
Thank you chair,
The last year saw armed drones transform conflict. New iterations of military drones, and adaptations of commercial platforms - often at low cost - create new patterns of instability and uncertainty. Proliferating, across states and non-state armed groups, we now see individual attackers able to strike at longer ranges - changing the geographies of conflict and creating complex challenges for civilian protection.
The UN Secretary-General reports that drone attacks rose by some 4,000 per cent between 2020 and 2024. In Sudan, the UN documented more than 1,000 civilians killed in the first five months of 2026. In Ukraine, drones stalk individuals and strike cities - whilst cross-border drone attacks are expanding the battlefield deep into Russia also. In the Caribbean and the Pacific Ocean, drone strikes are killing suspected drug traffickers outside armed conflict. Across the Gulf, drones have hit water and airport infrastructure as well as civilian shipping, creating effects that reverberate internationally.
We see diverse patterns of harm:
● Keeping people under constant threat, the persistent surveillance of armed drones means the risk of violence can seem ever-present.
● Hunting individuals, drone operators film themselves pursuing individual people. In Kherson, the UN Commission of Inquiry found such attacks on civilians amounted to crimes against humanity. In Gaza, quadcopters have continued to kill civilians, including children, since the ceasefire.
● Attacking those who help. Humanitarian space is being denied as convoys are attacked and the threat of drones makes aid operations too risky.
● Killing outside armed conflict. Such as in Haiti, where Human Rights Watch reports that drone attacks have killed over 1,200 people in ten months.
● Destroying what sustains life, through strikes on energy, water systems and civilian shipping that cause reverberating harm far beyond an attack. Strikes on fossil-fuel production poison the environment. Fibre-optic cables and batteries are being littered across fields and forests.
● And leaving explosive remnants. They have scattered prohibited anti-personnel mines, and explosive submunitions, and the drones themselves can present explosive hazards where they fall. Improvised and 3D-printed munitions mean clearance teams cannot know the technical challenges they face.
Drones came to the fore as tools of extrajudicial killing, but they also now bring widespread explosive force to populated areas. They are at the forefront of lethal autonomy and they feed (and operate under) the databases and algorithms of AI in the military domain. Their dual-use components, software and improvisation challenge export controls, whilst uncertainty of attribution undermines peace and security, and sustains impunity.
The ICRC has stressed that distance does not lessen legal obligations. It should not license permissive interpretations of the law, nor should it lower the threshold for resorting to the use of force.
Chair,
First Committee must address a technology that challenges our ability to uphold protective standards.
We urge Member States, to:
● Condemn the use of drones for extrajudicial killings, to threaten humanitarian assistance, or to terrorise civilians, and reaffirm that international law applies in full, rejecting permissive interpretations;
● Move urgently to legal negotiations on autonomous weapons systems;
● Endorse the Political Declaration on explosive weapons in populated areas;
● Reject the use of armed drones in law enforcement or by private military and security companies;
● Track and publish data on civilian harm, and ensure victims’ access to justice and reparations;
● Strengthen national and multilateral systems for export control, covering all relevant technologies and conditioning transfers on recipients’ respect for international law;
● Uphold the Mine Ban Treaty, the Convention on Cluster Munitions and CCW Protocol 5, ensuring that their legal obligations are applied to drone-delivered munitions and addressing the legacies of their use.
Chair, finally,
We call on States to use the First Committee to initiate an inclusive policy process - in collaboration with civil society, academics and survivors - that can develop new international standards and ensure existing frameworks respond effectively to this challenge. Armed drones are a critical issue for international peace and security. Their implications for the protection of civilians and for upholding international law need urgently to be addressed.
Thank you, chair.
This statement was coordinated by Article 36 and endorsed by:
A world without chemical and biological weapons
Access Now
Action on Armed Violence
ACTORS Rwanda (ARO)
Association Italiana Medicina per la Prevenzione della Guerra Nucleare (AIMPGN)
Alianza por el Desarme Nuclear
Amnesty International
Aotearoa New Zealand Campaign on Military Spending
Aotearoa New Zealand Joint Working Group on Landmines and Cluster Munitions
Article 36
Associazione nazionale vittime civili di guerra
Ban Landmines Campaign Nepal (NCBL)
Campaign Against Arms Trade
Campaña Colombiana Contra Minas (CCCM)
Cambodian Campaign to Ban Landmines (CCBL)
Centro de Estudios Ecuménicos, México
Center for Civilians in Conflict (CIVIC)
CND Cymru
CODEPINK
Conflict and Environment Observatory
Deutsche Friedensgesellschaft – Vereinigte KriegsdienstgegnerInnen e.V. (DFG-VK)
Development and Ability Org (DAO)
Dhesarme - Brazilian Action for Humanitarian Disarmament
Disability Rights and Disarmament Initiative (DRDI)
Drone Wars UK
ECPAT Guatemala / SEHLAC
Facing Finance e.V.
Fellowship of Reconciliation - USA
FEPAD Burundi / Femmes Engagées à consolider la Paix et l'Assainissement pour le Développement durable
Foundation for Peace and Democracy (Funpadem)
Frauennetzwerk für Frieden e. V. / Women's Network for Peace, Germany
Human Rights Now
IANSA Women Network Nigeria
International Campaign to Ban Landmines - Cluster Munition Coalition (ICBL-CMC)
International Network on Explosive Weapons (INEW)
International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR)
International Peace Bureau (IPB)
International Peace Research Association
Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS)
Kurdish organizations Network coalition for the International Criminal Court (KONCICC)
Kurdistan organizations Network to Abolish Nuclear and Mass Destruction Weapons (KONW)
Kurdistan without Genocide
Legacies of War
Living Basins Africa
Maat for peace development and human rights
Medact
Mines Action Canada
Mines Advisory Group (MAG)
Nonviolence International
Nonviolence International Canada
Norwegian People's Aid
Organization Against Weapons of Mass Destruction in Kurdistan
Organization of the Justice Campaign - OJC
Pacific Network on Globalisation (PAN)
PAX
Pax Christi Ireland
Peace Movement Aotearoa
Peoples Federation for National Peace and Development (PEFENAP)
PolicyLab Africa
Privacy International
Protection
Qazaq Nuclear Frontline Coalition
RASALAO régional
Rete Italiana Pace Disarmo
Roots Action
Saferworld
SANE Policy Institute
SEHLAC
SMEX
Soka Gakkai International
Somali Human Rights Association (SOHRA)
Stop Killer Robots
Stop Killer Robots UK
Stop Wapenhandel
Sustainable Peace and Development Organization
Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society
TEDIC
Transparency Advocacy
United Against Inhumanity (UAI)
Virtual Planet Africa
Vision GRAM-International
West Virginia Campaign to Ban Landmines and Cluster Munitions
Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
World BEYOND War
Youths Awaken Foundation (YAF)