Time to make EU’s arms code binding

By David Cronin

Date: 20/055/04

FRANCE is once again at loggerheads with the Anglo-American alliance that declared war on Iraq. This time Paris is venting its fury over efforts to keep the name of Moscow-based arms broker Viktor Bout from a UN move to freeze his assets.

Although then UK foreign officer minister Peter Hain labelled Bout a "merchant of death" in 2000, due to his role in fuelling some of Africa's bloody conflicts, it appears London and Washington want to protect the former KGB officer because he has aided their troops in Iraq.

Bout is one of many unscrupulous dealers who have been able to ply their trade by exploiting weaknesses in the EU's 1998 code of conduct on arms exports.

Although the code stipulates that EU countries "will not allow exports which could provoke or prolong armed conflict or aggravate existing tensions or conflicts in the recipient state", this has not prevented supplies going to trouble-spots in west Africa.

The Bout-owned Central African Airlines, for example, has worked with Renan Airways of Moldova to ship arms to Sierra Leone, where civil war erupted in 1991. The aircraft used by Renan Airways belong to Irish-registered firm Balcombe Investments.

In a new 109-page report, Amnesty International cites a plethora of cases in which military or security equipment manufactured in EU countries have been shipped to repressive regimes or countries with a dodgy human rights record. According to Amnesty, these exports expose the code as "deeply flawed".

Its voluminous nature notwithstanding, the report gives only a partial picture, as the trade in arms and torture instruments is characterized by stealth.

The Netherlands is alone among the 15 'old' EU states in publishing details of cases where it decides to deny a licence for the export of such equipment. "All the rest of us do not, for our own reasons," UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has said.

From the information that is available, there are strong indications that agreed EU policies are either being ignored or interpreted in a highly creative manner.

The most controversial arms export question facing the EU recently has been over China. Eager to boost Sino-French commercial ties and a China-Europe strategic parttnership, Paris has been pushing for a lifting of the arms embargo slapped on the country following the brutal repression of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989.

In 2002, the UK authorities granted export licenses worth £50 million (around 70m euro) for military exports to China. Strictly speaking, these may not have flouted the terms of the embargo - which applies to 'lethal' equipment. Yet an analysis by conflict prevention advocates Saferworld says "it is clear that components for lethal systems" - including combat aircraft, frigates and combat helicopters - were involved.

The EU code of conduct also says that arms export licences will not be issued if there is a "clear risk" that the equipment concerned "might be used for internal repression".

Yet there is ample evidence to suggest that EU-based firms have directly contributed with arms supplies to repressive activities. Examples include:

• In 2002 the Dutch government granted Israel licences worth €1.46 million for goods connected with armoured vehicles, even though these are known to have been used in attacks on Palestinian civilians;
• since 1996, France's Roxel (previously known as Celerg) has had a joint project with Russia's Splav for developing 'enhanced range' ammunition for the Grad rocket system, which has been used extensively by Russian forces in attacks on Chechen towns and villages;
• in February 2003, Spain announced huge military assistance - believed to include the provision of Mirage fighter planes - to Colombia, where both security forces and paramilitaries linked to them have been involved in a range of human rights abuses.

Since 1 May, the code of conduct now applies to ten new member states. But major loopholes have been identified in the legislation of some of these mainly ex-communist countries. In 2000, a Mi-24 combat helicopter was exported from Slovakia to Liberia. This was illegal under international law, as a UN arms embargo had been slapped on the conflict-riven west African country, but not under Slovak national law.

"Key to the fiasco," Human Rights Watch discovered, was a legal provision on Bratislava's statute books enabling the transport because the helicopter had originally been transported to Slovakia from Kyrgyzstan for repair. As a result, the 'repair' operation was exempt from licencing requirements.

Amnesty, meanwhile, has expressed concerns about the fate of 'surplus' weaponry from the new EU entrants. Many of these are currently undergoing restructuring of their armies as part of the deals of their membership of NATO. This has involved getting rid of military hardware deemed surplus to needs. The Czech Republic has agreed to transfer rocket launchers to Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe in recent years - both countries currently synonymous with unrest.

Arms brokering, meanwhile, is an activity that has garnered attention in recent years. The brokers involved here essentially act as mediators between buyers and sellers.

One of them, Israeli citizen Leonid Minin, was arrested in Italy (from where some of his operations were conducted) in 2000 after he had defied UN embargoes by arranging arms supplies to the government in Liberia and the Revolutionary United Front guerilla movement in Sierra Leone. Yet the Italian Supreme Court found it could not prosecute Menin as the trafficked weapons did not touch Italian soil.

The EU's code of conduct is under review at Council of Ministers' level. In a recent written declaration, a cross-party gathering of MEPs argued that the code's inherent weakness is that it is not legally binding.

Taken en bloc, the EU's countries represent one of the world's biggest suppliers of weapons.

Thanks to enlargement, the Union now has some 400 firms producing small arms and light weapons, as well as several firms producing more sophisticated military hardware.

As things stand, it appears the Union is powerless to prevent them selling their wares to dubious customers. Only a radical revision of the code - and a decision to give it legal weight - would improve matters.

A new report by Amnesty International, 'Undermining global security: the European Union's arms exports', cites many cases in which military or security equipment manufactured in the European Union has been exported to countries with either repressive regimes or a poor human rights record. According to Amnesty, these exports expose the EU's 1998 Code of Conduct on Arms Exports as deeply flawed.

• Primary Source

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGACT300032004 http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGACT300032004

---