Guns and Human Rights: Major Powers, Global Arms Transfers, and Human Rights

Violations
Author(s): Lerna K. Yanik
Source: Human Rights Quarterly , May, 2006, Vol. 28, No. 2 (May, 2006), pp. 357-388
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press

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HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY

Guns and Human Rights: Major Powers,

Global Arms Transfers, and Human
Rights Violations

Lerna K. Yanik*

ABSTRACT
In the recent past, there have been countless instances of arms transfers to
countries with problematic human rights records, many of which have been
cited in the reports of various advocacy groups. However, so far, the amount
of research classifying these flows has been limited. This study examines the
trends between 1999 and 2003 in arms transfer to countries with poor hu
man rights records, as well as the reasons for continuation of these transfers.
It puts forward two major arguments for these transfers to such countries.
First, the national and international codes ostensibly "prohibiting" transfers
to these countries are crafted in a way that eventually plays into the hands
of the countries and manufacturers that want to transfer. Second, the end
of the Cold War has turned the arms transfer market into a buyer's market
more than ever. The declining domestic military spending experienced in
most of the seller countries has forced arms manufacturers to pursue markets
beyond their borders, sometimes even illegally and illicitly.

I. INTRODUCTION

As the first Gulf War started in January 1991, the Coalition forces that
were determined to remove the Iraqi occupation forces in Kuwait quickly
discovered that some of their weapons were not quite usable. While the

* Lerna K. Yanik is Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, teaching international

politics at Bilkent University in Ankara, Turkey.
A previous version of this article was presented at the Annual Meeting of the International
Studies Association (ISA) 1 7-21 March 2004, Montreal, PQ, Canada. The author would like
to thank the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) for their kind permission
to use the data on arms transfers. The usual disclaimers apply.

Human Rights Quarterly 28 (2006) 357-388 ? 2006 by The Johns Hopkins University Press

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 358 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

French were unable to use their Mirage fighter jets because the Coalition
forces could not distinguish the French Mirages from "enemy" Iraqi Mirages
sold to Iraq by France, it also soon became clear that the radar jamming
systems purchased by Iraq from the British created a great danger for the
Coalition forces.1 The French and the British were not alone in arming Iraq,
a country that was at war with Iran and that brutally repressed its minorities.
The Soviet Union, the United States, Germany, and many other countries
throughout the 1970s and the 1980s had literally raced with each other to
sell arms, both conventional and unconventional, to Iraq.2 Similarly, before
the Rwandan genocide in 1994, various countries, including South Africa,
Israel, Albania, France, and Bulgaria, had no problems showering arms on
a country where ethnic tensions were on the brink of explosion.3
These two examples are the best-known cases of arms sales by mostly
Western powers to countries undergoing violations of human rights in conflict.
Yet, they are not part of a distant history. While the international community
has embargoed the delivery of arms to several countries in conflict,4 the
practice of delivering arms to conflict zones or to countries with imperfect
human rights still continues, and there are many examples. For example,
in the early 1990s, Italian arms and ammunition made their way to Sierra
Leone and Congo, two countries embroiled in ethnic conflict.5 Similarly,
The Guardian, in a July 2002 article, noted sharp increases in British arms
exports to Israel, Pakistan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Jordan, and India.6
On the other hand, when the approval of arms sales to Nepal, a country in
conflict and with a poor human rights record, surfaced in Belgium in July
2002, it led to the resignation of the Finance Minister Magda Alvoet.7 More

1. Neil Cooper, The Business of Death: Britain's Arms Trade at Home and Abroad 147 (1997).
2. Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Imported Weapons to Iraq, 1970
2004, available at http://www.sipri.org/contents/armstrad/atirq_data.html/view?searchterm=.
5ee also Neil Mackay, Revealed: 17 British Firms Armed Saddam with His Weapons,
Sunday Herald, 25 Feb. 2003, available at http://www.zmag.org/content/print_article.
cfm?itemlD=3124&sectionlD=10; BBC News, On This Day: 15 February, 1996: Arms-to
Iraq Report Published, available at http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/febru
ary/15/newsid_2544000/2544355.stm; Fred Barbash, Report Reveals British Deceit, Denial,
And Cover-up in '80s Arms Sales to Iraq, Wash. Post, 16 Feb. 1996, at A3; Michael Dobbs,
US Had Key Role in Iraq Buildup, Wash. Post, 30 Dec. 2002, at A1.
3. George Bloch, France Discloses Arms Sales: Exports Grow Despite Curbs Imposed by
EU, Wash. Times, 9 Apr. 2000, at C-10; Lisa Misol, Weapons and War Crimes: The Com
plicity of Arms Suppliers, in Human Rights Watch, World Report 2004 (2004), available
at http://hrw.org/wr2k4/13.htm.
4. SIPRI, International Arms Embargoes, 1998-2004, available at http://www.sipri.org/con
tents/armstrad/embargoes.html.
5. Brian Wood, Stopping the Global Terror Trade, Speech at the European Social Forum
(2002), available at http://web.amnesty.org/pages/ec_briefings_fora_msp.
6. Richard Norton-Taylor, Britain Doubles Arms Sold to Israel: Annual Report of Weapons
Exports Lists Destinations from Channel Islands to Pakistan, Guardian, 20 July 2002,
available at http://www.guardian.co.uk/armstrade/story/0,10674,758666,00.html.
7. Bernard Adam, Belgium Makes the European Code of Conduct Legally Binding, Iansa
News, Dec. 2002, available at http://www.iansa.org/newsletter/dec2002.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 359

importantly, the United States, a country that is considered to have the most
sophisticated laws on arms transfers, decided to lift the sanctions imposed
on India and Pakistan after 11 September 2001 and resumed the transfer
of arms to both of these countries as new allies of the United States in the
"War Against Terrorism/'8
The examples of arms transfers to countries with problematic human
rights records are countless. There are many more contextual examples cited
in the reports of various advocacy groups,9 but so far, there has been limited
research classifying these flows. This article examines the trends between
1999 and 2003 in arms transfer to countries with poor human rights records
and the reasons for the continuation of these transfers in spite of the presence
of various international and national laws ostensibly "prohibiting" transfers
to these countries. Some statistical studies have argued that after the end
of the Cold War, the United States started to pay attention to human rights
conditions in recipient countries; and thus, "countries that abuse human rights
were less likely to be recipients of American arms."10 While these statistical
studies tend to classify arms transfers as "less likely," when we look at the
practice, most supplier countries, including the United States, eventually
uphold their commercial and national security concerns and turn their backs
on human rights concerns that they have long championed.
The relation between arms transfers and the exacerbation of conflicts
and human rights violations has long been an established fact.11 This nasty

8. Bush Lifts Sanctions on India, Pakistan, Assoc. Press, 23 Sept. 2001.

9. See, e.g., Wood, supra note 5; Amnesty International, A Catalogue of Failures: G8 Arms Exports
and Human Rights Violations (2003), AI Index IOR 30/003/2003, available at http://web.
amnesty.org/library/pdf/IOR300032003ENGLISH/$File/IOR3000303.pdf; Press Release,
Amnesty International, Global Arms Trade Dangerously Unregulated (9 Oct. 2003),
available at http://www.controlarms.org/latest_news/launch_pr.htm.
10. Shannon Lindsey Blanton, Foreign Policy in Transition? Human Rights, Democracy, and
U.S. Arms Transfers, 49 Int'l Studies Q. 647, 660 (2005).
11. Shannon Lindsey Blanton, Promoting Human Rights and Democracy in the Developing
World: US Rhetoric versus US Arms Exports, 44 Am. J. Pol. Sci. 123 (2000); Shannon
Lindsey Blanton, Instruments of Security or Tools of Repression? Arms Imports and Hu
man Rights Conditions in Developing Countries, 36 J. Peace Res. 233 (1999); Cassady
Craft & Joseph P. Smaldone, The Arms Trade and the Incidence of Political Violence in
Sub-Saharan Africa, 39 J. Peace Res. 693 (2002); Gregory S. Sanjian, Promoting Stability
or Instability? Arms Transfers and Regional Rivalries, 1950-1991, 43 Int'l Stud. Q. 641
(1999); Mohammed Ayoob, The Security Problematic of Third World, 43 World Pol. 257,
274 (1991); Michael T. Klare, Wars in the 1990s: Growing Firepower in Third World,
46 Bull. Atom. Scientist 9 (1990); William D. H?rtung & Bridget Moix, Deadly Legacy:
US Arms to Africa and the Congo War, World Pol. Inst. Arms Trade Res. Center (2000),
available at www.worldpolicy.org/projects/arms/reports/congo.htm. A statistical study
conducted by David Kinsella and Howard K. Tiilema argues that while the arms supplies
by the United States into Middle East had a stabilizing effect, this was not the case for
Soviet arms transfers. See David Kinsella & Howard K. Tiilema, Arms and Aggression in
the Middle East: Overt Military Intervention 1948-1991, 39 J. Conflict Res.

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 360 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

relation between arms trade and human rights forced supplier countries,
which correspond mostly to the most developed countries of the world, to
enact various laws and codes at the national and international level. For
example, supplier countries enacted laws prohibiting or "discouraging" arms
transfers to countries with poor human rights records. Despite all of these
laws and codes, supplier countries do transfer conventional weapons to
countries with dubious human rights records. This practice, in most cases,
eventually creates a cycle that worsens human rights conditions in these
recipient countries.
This article is composed of eight sections. After this brief introduction,
the second section introduces the article's methodology. The third and fourth
sections examine the top ten suppliers of conventional arms between 1999
and 2003, followed by the top sixty recipients of conventional arms during
these years and their share in global arms transfers, as well as human rights
records in these countries. The fifth section discusses arms exports laws and
codes in major supplier countries at the domestic and international levels.
While discussing these laws, special attention is paid to whether these laws
and codes consider human rights conditions in recipient countries. The sixth
and seventh sections analyze the changing dynamics of the post-Cold War
global arms trade, including the black and gray markets for small arms.
Finally, the conclusion reiterates the findings and arguments and describes
current attempts to regulate conventional arms transfers globally.
While making this analysis regarding arms transfers to countries with poor
human rights and conflict zones, I develop two main arguments as factors
that contribute to the continuation of arms transfers to such countries. First,
as will be elaborated in detail below, national and international codes are
crafted in a way that creates an enormous space in which supplier countries
can maneuver. The laws, whether national or international, are in place in
theory; but when one looks at the way in which these laws are crafted,
they are open to interpretation. Second, with the end of the Cold War, the
global conventional arms market has become an unprecedented buyer's
market. The Cold War created a decline in domestic military expenditures
and forced arms manufacturers to look beyond their own domestic markets.
This decline was much worse in the countries of the former Soviet Union
and in some Eastern European countries. These countries ended up looking
for customers around the world more aggressively and sometimes more
illegally and more illicitly than ever before. These legal, illegal, and illicit
alternatives not only reduce compliance with laws and regulations that are

306 (1995). However, Jochen Mayer and Ralph Rotte, by using a more sophisticated
statistical method, have argued that stability in the Middle East was provided only when
there was a low level of arms supplies. Higher levels of supplies, they argued, created
instability in the region. See Jochen Mayer & Ralph Rotte, Arms and Aggression in the
Middle East, 43 J. Conflict Res. 45 (1999).

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 361

supposed to impede arms transfers, but faced with competition, legal and
illegal, major supplier countries are more unwilling to come up with tighter
laws and regulations at national and international levels that might entirely
halt transfers to countries with poor human rights records.

II. THE METHOD

This article utilizes several different databases and rankings. First, to rank top
supplier and recipient countries between 1999 and 2003, the article uses
the rankings provided by the Stockholm Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) in
Chapter 12 of their SIPRI Yearbook 2004: Armaments, Disarmament and
International Security. Because the article examines whether the top ten
suppliers of global arms were equipped with laws and regulations, both at
the national and international level, it took human rights conditions in the
recipient country into consideration; the laws by which these countries were
bound nationally and internationally were checked from the National Export
Control Table, which can be accessed at the SIPRI website.12 The results are
reflected in Figure 1 below.
Second, the article determines the top arms recipients with problematic
human rights records by matching the top sixty recipients rankings between
the years 1999 and 2003 with the rankings of the Freedom House between
1999 and 2003 (see Figure 2).13 The article utilizes the same categorizations
{Free, Partly Free, and Not Free) used in the Freedom House Report.I4
Furthermore, because conflicts and human rights violations go hand in
hand, the article tracks whether an internal or an external conflict existed in
these countries between 1999 and 2003. For this, the author mainly relied
on the International Peace Research Institute's armed conflict database.15

III. THE SUPPLIERS

The end of the Cold War led to a decline in the volume of arms transfers
around the world. In 1988, $35 billion worth of arms was transferred
globally.16 This number was reduced to $20 billion in 1995 and has been

12. SIPRI, National Export Control Table, available at http://projects.sipri.se/expcon/natexp

con/cou ntry_matrix. htm I.
13. Freedom House, Freedom in the World Comparative Rankings: 1973-2005, Freedom in the
World, available at http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=15&year=2005.
14. Id.
15. International Peace Research Institute, Oslo (PRIO), Active Conflicts 2003, available at
http://www.prio.no/cwp/armedconflict/current/active_conflicts_2003.pdf.
16. Bj?rn Hagelin et al., International Arms Transfers, in SIPRI Yearbook 2003: Armaments,
Disarmament and International Security 440, fig. 13.1 (2003) [hereinafter SIPRI Yearbook
2003].

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362 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

fluctuating around this level since then.17 Since the end of the Cold War,
the lion's share of the arms trade belongs to the United States. According to
SIPRI estimates, between 1999 and 2003 the United States accounted for
the 34 percent of all global conventional arms transfers.18 During the same
period, Russia ranked second with a 30 percent share, followed by France
with a 7.2 percent share in global arms transfers.19 Germany and the United
Kingdom ranked fourth and fifth, respectively, with almost a 5.9 percent
and a 4.8 percent share each.20 Ukraine's share was almost 2.5 percent,
followed by Italy at seventh with a 1.9 percent share.21 China, the largest
importer of arms, with a 1.7 percent share, ranked as the eighth supplier.22
The Netherlands and Canada ranked ninth and tenth, respectively, with a
1.4 percent share each.23 All ten countries accounted for almost 91 percent
of the global arms transfers between 1999 and 2003.24

FIGURE I
The Top Ten Suppliers and The Treaties That They Have Signed*

National
Arms Transfers EU Wassenaar OSCE UN Register
to the World Legislation Code of Agreement (Regular
(1999-2003) Conduct Contribution)
USA 34.0% Yes NA X X
Russia 30.0% No NA X X
France 7.2% Yes X X X
Germany 5.9% Yes X X X
UK 4.8% Yes X X X
Ukraine 2.5% No NA X X
Italy 1.9% Yes X X X
China 1.7% No NA
9 Netherlands 1.4% Yes X
10 Canada 1.4% Yes NA
Total For Top Ten
Supplier Countries 90.8%

17. Id.
18. Derived from Bj?rn Hagel in et al., Appendix 12A: The Volume of Transfers of Major
Conventional Weapons: By Recipients and Suppliers, 1999-2003, in SIPRI Yearbook
2004: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security 479-80 (2004) [hereinafter SIPRI
Yearbook 2004].
19. Id.
20. Id.
21. Id.
22. Id.
23. Id.
24. Id. See Figure I.
25. Id. at 479-80; SIPRI, Table of Membership of Multilateral Military Related Export Control
Regimes, National Export Control Table, available at http://projects.sipri.se/expcon/nat
expcon/countrymatrix.html.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 363

All top supplier countries have domestic laws regulating arms exports.
However, only the laws in the United States, France, Germany, the United
Kingdom, Italy, the Netherlands, and Canada stipulate that when exporting
arms, the licensing authorities must consider human rights records in the
recipient country.26 With the exception of China, all top supplier countries
have become parties to various international codes and regimes. These
international regimes and codes, again to varying degrees, also urge these
countries to take human rights conditions in recipient countries into consid
eration when transferring arms. These regimes and codes are: the European
Union (EU) Code of Conduct,27 the Wassenaar Agreement,28 the Organization
for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Principles,29 and the United
Nations (UN) Register.30 After examining the top suppliers and recipients,
the article examines these national laws and international regimes and how
they approach the issue of human rights in the recipient country to which
arms are being transferred.

IV. THE RECIPIENTS: THE CLIENTS: THE "BEST" BUYERS

Figure 2, below, details the top sixty recipients of arms in the world between
1999 and 2003, human rights conditions in these countries, and the pres
ence or the absence of a conflict (internal or external) in these countries.
These top sixty countries received almost 96 percent of the arms globally
transferred during this period. In this list there are thirty countries classified
as Not Free or Partly Free between 1999 and 2003 in the Freedom House
Ratings. Furthermore, among the top sixty recipients, there are fourteen
countries that were involved in some form of conflict between 1999 and
2003. Two of these countries, namely India and Israel, are considered Free
but were involved in various degrees of conflict during these years. In sum
mary, among the top sixty, twelve countries have both poor human rights
records and have been engaged in conflict.
These thirty countries accounted for almost 46 percent of the $40 billion
worth of arms delivered globally between 1999 and 2003.31 In other words,
almost half of the global arms trade ended up in the hands of countries with
poor human rights records.

26. Id.
27. European Union (EU) Code of Conduct, available at http://www.fas.org/asmp/campaigns/
code/eucodetext. htm.
28. SIPRI, Public Statement, 2005 Plenary Meeting of the Wassenaar Arrangement on Export
Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies, 13-14 Dec.
2005, available at http://projects.sipri.se/expcon/wass_elements.htm.
29. See generally Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), available at
http://www.osce.org/.
30. General and Complete Disarmament, Transparency in Armaments, U.N. GAOR, 46th
Sess., U.N. Doc. A/RES/46/36 (1991).
31. See Figure II.

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364 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

FIGURE II
The Top Sixty Recipients of Arms Between
1999 and 2003 and Their Human Rights Records3:

1999-2003 1999-2003 Freedom History of

Arms Deliveries % of All Global House Conflict
Deliveries Ratings Between
1999-2003 1999-2003
1 China 11800m 13.4% NF No
2 India 7843 m 8.9% F Yes
3 Greece 4409m 5.0% F No
4 Turkey 3497m 4.0% PF Yes
5 UK 3256m 3.7% F No
6 Egypt 3235m 3.7% NF No
7 Taiwan 3084m 3.5% F No
8 S. Korea 2855m 3.2% F No
9 Pakistan 2525m 2.9% NF Yes
10 Saudi Arabia 2420m 2.7% NF No
11 Australia 2394m 2.7% F No
12 Israel 2195m 2.5% F Yes
13 UAE 2120m 2.4% NF No
14 Algeria 2095m 2.4% NF Yes
15 Japan 1795m 2.0% F No
16 Iran 1640m 1.9% NF No
17 Finland 1476m 1.6% F No
18 Canada 1382m 1.5% F No
19 USA 1282m 1.5% F No
20 Singapore 1282m 1.5% PF No
21 Italy 1270m 1.4% F No
22 Malaysia 1205m 1.4% PF No
23 Brazil 1139m 1.3% PF/F No
24 Spain 1066m 1.2% F No
25 Netherlands 954m 1.1% F No
26 Poland 925m 1.0% F No
27 Angola 839m 1.0% NF Yes/No
28 Yemen 821m 0.9% NF/PF No
29 Indonesia 769m 0.9% PF Yes
30 Jordan 752 m 0.8% PF No
31 Norway 694m 0.8% F No
32 Argentina 694m 0.8% F/PF No
33 Thailand 680m 0.8% F No
34 Switzerland 652m 0.7% F No
35 Bangladesh 611m 0.7% PF No
36 Chile 571m 0.6% F No
37 Colombia 490m 0.6% PF No
38 Myanmar 478m 0.5% NF Yes
39 Germany 477m 0.5% F No

Continued on pg. 365

32. Hagelin et al., Appendix 12A: The Volume of Transfers of Major Conventional Weapons:
By Recipients and Suppliers, 1999-2003, supra note 18, at 475-76. Additional data was
received from SIPRI via e-mail. Freedom House, Freedom in the World Comparative
Rankings: 1973-2005, Freedom in the World, supra note 13; PRIO, Active Conflicts
2003, supra note 15.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 365

FIGURE II, continued

The Top Sixty Recipients of Arms Between
1999 and 2003 and Their Human Rights Records

1999-2003 1999-2003 Freedom History of

Arms Deliveries1 % of All Global House Conflict
Deliveries Ratings Between
1999-2003 1999-2003
40 Syria 470m 0.5% NF No
41 New Zealand 450m 0.5% F No
42 Sri Lanka 423m 0.5% PF Yes
43 Bahrain 403 m 0.5% NF/PF No
44 Sweden 391m 0.4% F No
45 Mexico 383m 0.4% PF/F No
46 Vietnam 376m 0.4% NF No
47 Kazakhstan 373m 0.4% NF No
48 Cyprus 372m 0.4% F No
49 Kuwait 365m 0.4% PF No
50 Morocco 357m 0.4% PF No
51 Denmark 324m 0.4% F No
52 Venezuela 283m 0.3% PF No
53 France 273m 0.3% F No
54 Peru 264m 0.3% PF/F No
55 Eritrea 254m 0.3% NF Yes
56 Sudan 239m 0.3% NF Yes
57 Afghanistan 226m 0.3% NF Yes
58 Ethiopia 220m 0.2% PF Yes
59 Congo 218m 0.2% NF/PF Yes/No
60 Macedonia 216m 0.2% PF No
84552m 96%

When transfers to these recipient countries in the top ten are considered,
Russia emerges as the major supplier to China and India, while the United
States emerges as the major supplier to Turkey, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia.33
Russia's emergence as the top supplier to China and India is mainly due
to the sanctions imposed on China by the United States and the European
Union, and on India by the United States.34
The United States and the European Union imposed an arms embargo on
China in the aftermath of the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989, pointing
out severe human rights violations in that country.35 Yet Russia, by becom
ing the top and the only supplier, was quite effective in filling the void that

33. See Figure III.

34. Bj?rn Hagelin et al., Transfers of Major Conventional Weapons, in SIPRI Yearbook 2000:
Armament, Disarmament and International Security 29-30 (2000) [hereinafter SIPRI Yearbook
2000].
35. Gabrielle Kohlmeier, EU Eyes Lifting China Arms Embargo (2004), available at http://www.
armscontrol.org/act/2004_09/EU.asp.

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366 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

the Westerners had left. The United States also imposed sanctions on India
following a nuclear test in May 1998.36 Sanctions on Pakistan were imposed
in 1979, 1990, 1998, and finally in 1999 after Pervez Musharraf toppled the
civilian government with a military coup.37 After 11 September 2001, with
the exception of the sanctions imposed on Pakistan in 1999,38 all sanctions
were lifted by the United States; and Pakistan along with India were declared
allies in the "War Against Terror/'39 Meanwhile, like in the case of China,
Russia became the major supplier for India, while arms to Pakistan were
provided by China, France, Ukraine, and Italy during the sanction years.40

FIGURE III
The Suppliers and the Recipients41

Suppliers Recipients with Poor Human Rights Records and/or Conflict

USA Turkey,* Egypt,* Saudi Arabia,* Israel,* Singapore,* Jordan,
Bangladesh, Colombia,* Bahrain,*
Russia China,* India,* UAE, Algeria,* Iran,* Malaysia, Angola,
Yemen,* Indonesia, Bangladesh,* Colombia, Myanmar,*
Syria,* Sri Lanka, Vietnam,* Kazakhstan,* Peru,* Eritrea,*
Sudan,* Ethiopia
France Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, UAE,* Indonesia, Kuwait, Morocco,
Venezuela, India, Malaysia, Turkey, Jordan, Yemen
Germany Turkey, Egypt, Israel, Indonesia, India
UK Malaysia,* Indonesia, Jordan,* Kuwait, Bahrain, UAE, China,
India, Saudi Arabia
Ukraine Pakistan, Algeria, Iran, Angola, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Ethiopia,
Macedonia, Jordan, UAE
Italy Turkey, Pakistan, Singapore, Malaysia, Bangladesh, China,
India, Saudi Arabia, Singapore
China Egypt, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Kuwait,
Netherlands India, Bangladesh, Turkey, UAE, Indonesia, Malaysia
Canada Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, Venezuela,

*Denotes a major supplier (more than 50% of all arms transfers) to this country.

36. Press Release, The White House: Office of the Press Secretary, India Sanctions (13 May
1998), available at http://www.mac.doc.gov/sanctions/wh-state.htm.
37. Howard Diamond, U.S. Imposes Sanctions on Pakistan, N. Korea Following Missile
Test (1998), available at http://www.armscontrol.org/act/1998_04/sanap98.asp; Robert
Gard, India-Pakistan Sanctions Legislation Fact Sheet (2001), available at http://www.
armscontrolcenter.org/archives/000124.php.
38. Alex Wagner, Bush Waives Nuclear-Related Sanctions on India, Pakistan (2001 ), available
at http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2001_10/sanctionsoct01.asp. The sanctions imposed
in 1999 prohibit Pakistan from receiving American loans and military training.
39. Bush Lifts Sanctions on India, Pakistan, supra note 8.
40. 5ee Figure III.
41. Hagelin, et al., Appendix 12A: The Volume of Transfers of Major Conventional Weapons:
By Recipients and Suppliers, 1999-2003, supra note 18, at 474-80. Additional data
were received from SIPRI via e-mail.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 367

As demonstrated in Figure 3, between 1999 and 2003, the United States

supplied arms to nine of the thirty-two countries classified as Not Free or
Partly Free and/or with a conflict. Russia provided arms to twenty countries;
France to twelve; Germany to five; the United Kingdom to nine; Ukraine
to ten; Italy to nine; China to five; the Netherlands to six; and Canada to
three. While Russia ranked second and supplied 30 percent of all the arms
transferred globally between 1999 and 2003, it had the most diversified
client portfolio.
Why do major suppliers, given their diversified portfolios, and despite the
proven adverse effects of supplying arms to countries in conflict and/or with
poor human rights records, continue supply weapons to these nations?
There are several reasons. First, as described below, almost all of the
major suppliers follow domestic and international codes that, to some de
gree, force the officials of the state issuing arms export licenses to consider
human rights conditions in the recipient country. However, these laws and
regulations fail to stop the arms transfers to such countries because of their
elastic wording. Second, the end of the Cold War contributed to a decline
in domestic military expenditures in the major supplier countries, leading
manufacturers and suppliers of arms to market their products more aggres
sively in the global market. The situation was more acute for the former
communist countries because of their dependency on arms exports as their
major export. This dependency forced them to pursue marketing policies,
sometimes illegal and illicit, especially in small arms.

V. THE LAWS

As stated above, with the exception of Russia, China, and Ukraine, all top ten
supplier countries have national legislation that urge the export license-issuing
authorities to consider human rights conditions, albeit to varying degrees, in
recipient countries. These laws have one point in common: their openness
to interpretation that creates uncertainty about whether the law in question
will be applied. This, in a sense, indicates the unwillingness of countries
with greater stakes in global arms transfers to create stricter laws.

A. National Codes on Arms Transfers in Top Supplier Countries

Among supplier countries, the United States is probably the country with
the most sophisticated laws on arms exports that leave the country either
as a foreign military sales (FMS) (i.e., sale directly from the US government
to another government) or direct commercial sale (i.e., sale from US arms
manufacturers to public or private persons around the world). There are

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368 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

different sets of laws and regulations that wholly or partially govern US

arms exports: The Foreign Assistance Act (FAA) of 1961,42 the Arms Export
Control Act (AECA) of 1976, which are located respectively in Chapters 32
and 39 of Title 22 of the United States Code,43 the International Traffic in
Arms Regulations (ITAR),44 the Export Administration Act (EAA) of 1979,45
and parts of the Foreign Operations Appropriations Act.46
The Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 regulates foreign (economic and
military) assistance from the United States to other countries. The Act states
that the foreign policy goal of the United States is "to promote the increased
observance of internationally recognized human rights by all countries/'47
The second part of the Act stipulates that "no security assistance may be
provided to any country the government of which engages in a consistent
pattern of gross violations of internationally recognized human rights/'48
However, the very same paragraph grants the President the right to make
exceptions when necessary.49
The Arms Export Control Act of 1976 is considered the main law that
directly regulates the arms exports of the United States.50 Section 2751 of the
Code states that arms transfers can only take place if they are "consistent"
with the principles set forth in Section 2304.51 Section 2778 of Chapter 39
authorizes the President to regulate the arms exports of the United States.52
This authority, however, has been delegated to the State Department and put

42. 22 U.S.C. ? 2304 (2002).

43. Lora Lumpe & Jeff Donarski, The Arms Trade Revealed: A Guide for Investigators and Activists
(1998), available at http://www.fas.org/asmp/library/handbook/WaysandMeans.html. In
addition to these laws, in June 1999, there was an attempt to create a Code of Conduct
for American arms exports. The resolution, HR 2269, contained clauses that would pro
hibit the sale of American arms to countries that did not "promote democracy, respect
human rights and participate in UN Register of Conventional Arms." H.R. 2269, 106th
Cong. (1999). However, the bill its original shape did not become a law. A diluted ver
sion of the bill that was enacted in November 1999 stated that the American president
"shall attempt to achieve the foreign policy goal of an international arms sales code
of conduct. . . [and] take the necessary steps to begin negotiations within appropriate
international fora not later than 120 days after the date of the enactment of this Act."
Pub. L. 106-13, div. B, ? 1000(a)(7), 29 Nov. 1999, 113 Stat. 1536, 1501A-508. See
also Emanuela Gillard, What is Legal? What is Illegal? A Background Paper on the ATT
Convention, Limitations on Transfers of Small Arms Under International Law (2003),
available at http://www.grip.org/bdg/g4509.htm; Jonathan T. Stoel, Codes of Conduct
on Arms Transfers?The Movement Toward a Multilateral Approach, 31 L. & Pol'y Int'l
Bus. 1291, 1291-99 (2000).
44. Lumpe & Donarski, supra note 43.
45. Id.
46. Id.
47. 22 U.S.C. ? 2304, supra note 42.
48. Id.
49. Id.
50. Lumpe & Donarski, supra note 43.
51. 22 U.S.C. ?2751 (1999).
52. 22 U.S.C. ? 2778 (2004).

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 369

into practice as the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.53 The Export

Administration Act of 1979, on the other hand, regulates the exports of
dual-use goods.54 Neither ITAR nor EAA contains direct references to human
rights in recipient countries.
The final set of regulations that conditions US arms transfers upon human
rights conditions in recipient countries (though not exports specifically) is
the "Leahy Law" within the Foreign Operations Appropriations and Defense
Appropriations Acts.55 This law, introduced by Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy,
prohibits American military assistance to "any unit of the security forces of
a foreign country if the Secretary of State [or the Secretary of Defense] has
credible evidence that such unit has committed gross violations of human
rights."56 The Leahy Amendment was first introduced as part of the Interna
tional Narcotics Control Program of the State Department. In 1998, the law
was applied to all security assistance programs that were part of the Foreign
Operations Appropriations Act.57 In 1999, it became part of the Defense
Department Appropriations Act.58
Unfortunately, the Leahy Law has two weaknesses. First, the language
is open to interpretation. The Foreign Operations Appropriations Act, for
example, allows the Secretary of State to resume funding if the country with
human rights violations in question "is taking effective measures to bring the
responsible members of the security forces unit to justice."59 The Defense
Appropriations Bill includes similar language, authorizing the Secretary of
Defense to proceed with the funding if "all necessary corrective steps have
been taken."60 The State Department eventually agreed that the law's word

53. Lumpe & Donarski, supra note 43. International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) lists
several countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, etc., (of course, along with exceptional
circumstances) to which US arms exports are prohibited. See, e.g., U.S. Dept. of State,
ITAR, Part 126?General Policies and Provisions, available at http://pmdtc.org/docs/
ITAR/2005/22cfr126_Part_126.pdf.
54. The Export Administration Act of 1979 (EAA) was extended several times in the past
and last expired in 1994. The US President maintained EAA by executive order. A new
EAA was introduced in Congress in January 2001 but did not become law. The EAA of
2001 contains very equivocal language regarding human rights, stating several times
that the goal of the United States should be to "promote . . . respect for human rights/'
See S. Rep. No. 107-10, 107th Cong., 1st Sess. (2001), available at http://thomas.loc.
gov/cgi-bin/cpquery/T?&report=sr010&dbname=cp107&.
55. Foreign Operations Appropriations Act of 2002, Pub. L. No. 107-115, ? 556, 115 Stat.
2118 (2002), available at http://leahy.senate.gOv/issues/humanrights/107-115.html; Foreign
Operations Appropriations Act of 2001, Pub. L. 106-429, ? 563, 114 Stat. 1900 (2001),
available at http://www.ciponline.org/facts/leahy.htm.
56. See, e.g., id.
57. Center for International Policy, Limitation on Assistance to Security Forces, available at
http://www.ciponline.org/facts/leahy.htm.
58. Id.
59. Id.
60. See, e.g., Department of Defense Appropriations Bill of 2002, Pub. L. No. 107-117, ?
8093, 115 Stat. 2230 (2002), available at http://leahy.senate.gOv/issues/humanrights/107
117.html.

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370 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

ing should indicate that when the individual responsible for human rights
violations is "expelled" from the "unit," the funding of the "unit" could
continue.61 The second weakness of the Leahy Amendment is that it is not
a permanent feature of either the Foreign Operations Appropriations Act or
the Defense Operation Act. The amendment must be reintroduced every
year with the respective Foreign Operations Appropriations and Defense
Appropriations Acts. The Leahy Law has been applied to military assistance
to several countries. For example, assistance to Colombia has been condi
tion on the certification of the improvement of human rights in the country
by the US Secretary of State.62 However, the efficiency of this certification
procedure has been debated by various nongovernmental organizations
(NGOs). In a July 2003 statement, Human Rights Watch (HRW) argued
that these certifications were being issued by the Secretary of State without
improvement in human rights conditions.63
In 1939, France began drafting a series of laws to regulate its arms
exports.64 The "Statement on French policy on Export Controls for Conven
tional Arms and Dual-use Items Submitted to the Wassenaar Arrangement"
stipulates that France would exhibit "respect for the Purposes and Principles
of the Charter of the United Nations, human rights, embargoes and other
globally-agreed restrictive measures, arms control, and non-contribution
to regional instability or to the prolongation of ongoing armed conflicts."65
Furthermore, the same "Statement" notes that France "complies with the cri
teria laid down by the United Nations, the OSCE and the European Council"
and "[respects] human rights in the country of final destination."66 Similarly,
before recommending a transaction to the Prime Minister, the Committee
on the Export of War Weapons (CIEEMG) should evaluate human rights
conditions in the recipient country.67
Like France, the United Kingdom has laws governing arms exports dating
from 1939.68 The most recent of these laws that makes direct reference to

61. Center for International Policy, Limitation on Assistance to Security Forces, available at
http://www.ciponline.org/facts/leahy.htm.
62. See, e.g, Foreign Operations Appropriations Bill of 2002, supra note 55, ? 567; see also
Center for International Policy, Pub. L. 107-115, FY2002 Foreign Operations Appropria
tions Bill, 2002 Conditions on Aerial Fumigation Programs in Colombia, available at
http://leahy.senate.gOv/issues/foreign%20policy/107-115-colombia.html.
63. Human Rights Watch, Colombia: Human Rights Certification Under Public Law 108-7,
available at http://www.hrw.org/backgrounder/americas/colombia-certification5.htm.
64. SIPRI, France: Policy on Export Controls and Conventional Arms, Export Controls, ava/7
able at http://www.sipri.org/contents/expcon/frenchpolicy.html.
65. Id.
66. Id.
67. SIPRI, France: National Policy Statement, Export Controls, available at http://www.sipn.
org/contents/expcon/fraosce.html.
68. British American Security Information Council, Export Control in the Framework Agree
ment Countries, available at http://www.basicint.org/pubs/Research/2001 ExportControls2.
htm.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 371

human rights conditions in the recipient countries is the Export Control Act
of 2002. This legislation was created as a result of the Labor Party's campaign
promise to overhaul the arms exports laws when it was revealed that various
British companies were involved in arms and technology transfers to Iraq in
the 1980s and 1990s.69 The Export Control Act states:

[EJxport controls may be imposed in relation to any goods the exportation or

use of which is capable of having a relevant consequence. . . . [TJransfer con
trols may be imposed in relation to any technology the transfer or use of which
is capable of having such a consequence. . . . [TJechnical assistance controls
may be imposed in relation to any technical assistance the provision or use of
which is capable of having such a consequence. . . . [TJrade controls may be
imposed in relation to any goods the acquisition, disposal, movement or use
of which is capable of having such a consequence.70

In these articles the phrases "having a relevant consequence" or "such

a consequence" refer to a wide range of instances ranging from "having an
adverse effect on the national security of the United Kingdom and other
countries" to the "breaches of international law and human rights."71 Although
there is a direct reference to human rights in this law, the ambiguous wording
"may be imposed" creates uncertainty about the applicability of the law.72
Italian laws that regulate arms transfers and exports, enacted in 1990, also
make a direct reference to human rights conditions in the recipient country. Italian
Law 185 "forbids" arms exports to states "whose governments are responsible
for proven violations of international human rights conventions."73
German laws regarding arms exports and transfers are based on several
different pieces of legislation: the German Weapons Control Act of the Basic
Law;74 the War Weapons Reporting Ordinance of 1995;75 the Foreign Trade
and Payments Act of 1961;76 the Foreign Trade and Payments Ordinance of
1986;77 and the Policy Principles of the Government of the Federal Republic
of Germany for the Export of War Weapons and other Military Equipment.78
Among all of these, only the Policy Principles refer to human rights condi
tions in the recipient country.

69. Amnesty International, A Catalogue of Failures: G8 Arms Exports and Human Rights Violations,
supra note 9.
70. SIPRI, UK: Export Control Act, 2002, Export Controls, available at http://www.sipn.
org/contents/expcon/act2 002. htm I.
71. Id.
72. Id.
73. SIPRI, Italy: Provisions Governing the Export, Import, and Transit of Armaments, Export
Controls, available at http://www.sipri.org/contents/expcon/ita90law.html.
74. SIPRI, Germany: Export Controls, available at http://www.sipri.org/contents/expcon/ger
many.html.
75. Id.
76. Id.
77. Id.
78. Id.

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372 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

The Policy Principles of the Government of the Federal Republic of

Germany for the Export of War Weapons and Other Military Equipment,
introduced in 1982 (and later amended in 1999), are to be the "guidelines"
for German officials dealing with arms export licenses, and thus "limit . . .
discretion open to them."79 These Policy Principles are composed of three
sections. The first section, "General Principles," states that the goal of German
exports is to "secur[e] respect for human rights and promot[e] sustainable
development in all parts of the world."80 It further states that human rights
conditions in recipient countries are a "key factor" in the issuing of exports
licenses.81 According to these Policy Principles, export licenses "will not be
granted where there are reasonable grounds to suspect that they may be
used for internal repression as defined in the EU Code of Conduct for Arms
Exports, or the sustained and systematic abuse of human rights."82
However, the second section, which sets the guidelines for arms exports
to "NATO members, EU members, and countries with NATO-equivalent
status," has more ambiguous language regarding human rights conditions
in recipient countries.83 This section stipulates that

[the] Federal Government will raise objections against. . . exports where there
are reasonable grounds to suspect that they may be used for internal repression
as defined by the EU Code of Conduct for Arms Exports or the sustained and
systematic abuse of human rights.84

The third section of the Policy Principles dealing with arms transfers to
"other countries" uses the same ambiguous language:
Export licenses pursuant to the War Weapons Control Act and/or the Foreign
Trade and Payments Act will not be granted where the internal situation in the
country concerned precludes such action, e.g. in the case of armed conflict or
where there are reasonable grounds for suspecting such exports may be used
for internal repression or the sustained and systematic abuse of human rights.
In this context the human rights situation in the recipient country is a major
factor to be considered.85

79. SIPRI, Germany: Response to the Questionnaire on OSCE Policy for the Export of Con
ventional Arms, Export Controls, available at http://www.sipri.org/contents/expcon/frgosce.
html.
80. SIPRI, Germany: Policy Principles for the Export of Military Equipment, Export Controls,
available at http://www.sipri.org/contents/expcon/frg-guide.html.
81. Id.
82. Id.
83. Id.
84. Id.
85. Id.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 373

While Dutch laws reiterate "the international commitments" of the

country,86 the latest available arms export policy report issued by the Dutch
Ministry of Economic Affairs and Foreign Affairs states that "applications
for licenses for the export of military equipment are assessed on a case
by-case basis against the eight criteria of the arms export policy with due
consideration for the nature of the product, its country of final destination
and end user."87 The same report goes on to list the eight criteria of the EU
Code of Conduct, which include "the respect of human rights in the country
of final destination."88
Canadian arms exports are regulated by "guidelines" set forth in the
Export and Import Act of the country. The Act states that

Canada closely controls the export of military goods and technology to countries
that. . . have governments that have a persistent record of serious violations of
the human rights of their citizens, unless it can be demonstrated that there is no
reasonable risk that the goods might be used against the civilian population.89

By adding the "unless" clause, Canadian laws, like the laws of other
nations, create room for interpretation. Yet when it comes to exporting fire
arms, Canada has a slightly different procedure. According to the Canadian
Automatic Firearms Country Control List, Canadian manufacturers can sell
their automatic firearms to only sixteen countries.90
Among major supplier countries, only Russian, Chinese, and Ukrainian
arms exports laws do not directly refer to human rights conditions in the
recipient country. The closest that Russian law comes to mentioning human
rights is in Article 6 of the Federal Law of the Russian Federation on Mili
tary-Technical Cooperation of the Russian Federation With Foreign States.
This article stipulates, again very ambiguously, that the Russian president
will work to "support the execution of decisions of the Security Council
of the United Nations on action to maintain or restore international peace
and security and also to protect the national interests of the Russian Fed

86. SIPRI, Netherlands, Export Control, available at http://www.sipri.org/contents/expcon/

netherlands.html.
87. Ministry of Economic Affairs and The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Netherlands Arms Export
Policy in 2002 (2003), available at http://hei.unige.ch/sas/resources/Export%20Reports/
Netherlands.2002.Eng.pdf.
88. Id.
89. Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Canada, Military and Technology,
available at http://www.dfait-maeci.gc.ca/trade/eicb/military/intro-en.asp?#introduction;
Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Canada, Answers to Questions
about Canada's Export Control on Military Goods, available at http://www.dfait-maeci.
gc.ca/trade/eicb/military/documents/20qa-eng.pdf.
90. When the law was first initiated, this number was thirteen. See id.; Department of Jus
tice, Canada, Automatic Firearms Country Control List (Export and Import Permits Act)
SOR/91-575 (Can.), available at http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/E-19/SOR-91-575/100057.
html.

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374 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

eration."91 In a similar fashion, the Regulations of the People's Republic of

China on Administration of Arms Exports stipulate that while conducting
the arms trade, "no injury to the peace, security and stability of the region
concerned and the world as a whole" should ensue.92 Ukraine has various
laws directing arms exports, none of which refer to human rights conditions
in the recipient country.93
In summary, there are various national laws that tell these major supplier
countries to consider human rights conditions in recipient countries, albeit in
ambiguous language. Similar language can be found in international codes.
However, it can be argued that the language and usage of international codes
are much more flexible than national laws and codes.

B. International Codes and Regimes on Arms Transfers

The end of the Cold War saw the creation of a series of laws and regimes
in arms exports. These new laws and regimes were in part due to pressure
from civil society, in part due to the optimistic environment created in the
aftermath of the Cold War in which East-West conflict looked like a distant
memory, and in part due to various arms transfer scandals. Unfortunately,
these regimes, codes, and laws at the international level have not reached
their stated goal of creating a more responsible legal environment for arms
transfers.

1. UN Register of Conventional Arms (1992)

The goal of the UN Register of Conventional Arms was to create a medium

in which both supplier and recipient states disclose information about their
sales and purchases, as well as their domestic arms production and holdings.94
It is not, in other words, a regime prohibiting or discouraging arms transfers
to countries with imperfect human rights per se, but simply an exercise en
couraging transparency of conventional arms transfers, as well as holdings
and production. However, participating in the UN Register of Conventional
Arms is voluntary, meaning that states may choose not to participate at all
or that they can participate only when they wish to do so. This feature of

91. SIPRI, Federal Law of the Russian Federation on Military-Technical Cooperation of the
Russian Federation With Foreign States, available at http://projects.sipri.se/expcon/nat
expcon/Russia/114law.htm.
92. SIPRI, Regulations of the People's Republic of China on Administration of Arms Exports,
available at http://projects.sipri.se/expcon/natexpcon/China/chi_234reg.htm.
93. SIPRI, Ukraine, available at http://projects.sipri.se/expcon/natexpcon/Ukraine/ukraine.
htm.
94. See, e.g., Foreign Affairs, Canada, The UN Conventional Arms Register, available at
http://www.dfait-maeci.gc.ca/arms/convweap2-en.asp.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 375

the Register has created debates about the efficiency and the effectiveness
of the Register. In 1992, the first year of the Register, only ninety-five of the
179 existing members of the United Nations reported their arms purchases
along with their domestic production and holdings.95 The largest number of
countries reporting was reached in 2001 when 126 of the 189 members of
the United Nations reported to the UN Register.96 In 2004, 115 countries
had submitted a report to the Register.97
All top ten supplier countries, with the exception of China, have regularly
contributed to the Register since 1992. China, the eighth largest arms sup
plier and the largest arms recipient in the world between 1999 and 2003,
stopped responding to the Register in 1998.98 Although all of the major
supplier countries, again with the exception of China, have responded to
the Register, some major recipient countries have either not responded or
simply responded sporadically. For example, Iran has not reported to the
Register since 1998; and Egypt, Angola, Algeria, Syria, and Saudi Arabia
have not disclosed any information to the Register on their arms transfers
since the Register was launched in 1992. In the case of recipient countries,
nondisclosure of arms transfers does not damage the Register greatly because
the imports of these nonreporting countries are the exports of major supplier
countries. This practice ensures disclosure of arms transfers.

2. Wassenaar Agreement (1996)

The Wassenaar Agreement came to life in 1996 after the dissolution of the
Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (COCOM) in 1994."
The main goal of the Wasennaar Agreement is to encourage "transparency
and greater responsibility in transfers of conventional arms and dual-use
goods and technologies, thus preventing destabilising accumulations" by
creating "control lists."100 Currently, there are thirty-nine countries that have
signed the Agreement. All top ten suppliers, with the exception of China,
are parties to the Agreement.101

95. See United Nations Register of Conventional Arms, Composite Table, available at http://
disarmament2.un.org/UN_REGISTER.NSF.
96. Id.
97. Id.
98. The Chinese mission to the UN reports this date as 1998, but according to UN Register
it is 1996. See United Nations Register of Conventional Arms, Overall Participation,
available at http://disarmament.un.org/UN_Register.nsf.
99. COCOM was established by the United States and its NATO allies during the Cold War
as an "informal agreement" that made nonbinding recommendations on arms transfers
to participating states. See Michael Lipson, The Reincarnation of COCOM: Explaining
Post- Cold War Exports Controls, Non Proliferation Rev. 33-52 (1999).
100. SIPRI, Public Statement, 2005 Plenary Meeting of the Wassenaar Arrangement on Export
Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies, supra note 28.
101. For the most recent list of members, see id.

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376 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

The Wassenaar Agreement, irr its original formulation, did not stipulate
that the supplier country should take into consideration human rights con
ditions in the recipient country. However, an additional document entitled
"Elements for Objective Analysis and Advice Concerning Potentially Desta
bilising Accumulations of Conventional Weapons: Explanatory Note" defines
some "non-binding" guidelines by listing two questions regarding human
rights conditions in recipient countries.102 Although these added guidelines
"encourage" the participant states to consider human rights conditions in
recipient countries, they are not binding. It is simply "recommended" that
signatory states take these guidelines into consideration.

3. European Union (EU) Code of Conduct (1998)

In the aftermath of the Gulf War, when arms transfers to Iraq by EU member
states was revealed, the EU started work on a document that would guide
arms exports and standardize the national laws and practices.103 The EU
Code of Conduct (the Code), which has eight criteria binding the members
politically but not legally, was approved in June 1998.104
While Criterion Two extensively deals with human rights conditions in the
recipient country, the rest of the criteria encourage EU members to consider vari
ous conditions varying from "the behaviour of the buyer country with regard
to the international community" to "internal" and "regional peace, security
and stability" when transferring arms.105 The member states are expected to
apply these criteria while issuing or denying arms export licenses.
The language in the EU Code of Conduct regarding human rights in
recipient countries is more clearly defined, but still subject to interpretation.
Criterion 2 states that
Member States will:

a) not issue an export license if there is a clear risk that the proposed export
might be used for internal repression;

102. SIPRI, Elements for Objective Analysis and Advice Concerning Potentially Destabilizing
Accumulations of Conventional Weapons: Explanatory Note, available at http-.//projects.
sipri.se/expcon/waoban.htm. These questions are:
Is there a clearly identifiable risk that the weapons might be used for the violation and suppression
of human rights and fundamental freedoms? Does the state comply with internationally-recognised
human rights, anti-terrorism and non-proliferation norms?

103. Ian Anthony, National Policies and Regional Agreements on Arms Exports (2000), available
at http://www.unidir.ch/pdf/articles/pdf-art155.pdf; Council of Europe, Parliamentary
Assembly, Recommendation 1382 (1998), available at http://assembly.coe.int/Docu
ments/AdoptedText/ta98/EREC1382.htm.
104. SIPRI, EU Code of Conduct for Arms Exports, available at http://projects.sipri.se/expcon/
eucode.htm.
105. Id.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 377

b) exercise special caution and vigilance in issuing licenses, on a case-by-case

basis and taking account of the nature of the equipment, to countries where
serious violations of human rights have been established by the competent
bodies of the UN, the Council of Europe or by the EU.106

The ambiguity here lies in the criterium's wording. The phrase "might
be used for internal repression" leaves the assessment of the possibility of
repression to the supplier country. Furthermore, the Code does not specifically
prohibit the transfer of arms to countries in which human rights violations
are documented by various international institutions. Rather, it tells sup
plier countries simply to pay more attention, or as it is stated, to "exercise
special caution and vigilance" in transfers to countries with human rights
violations.107 This wording makes the Code open to interpretation and limits
its efficiency. Even David Andrews, then Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs,
was reported to have expressed his disappointment with human rights the
criterion when the Code was accepted.108
In case of license denials, the EU members are expected to inform other
members of these denials, as well as the reasons for the denials, "through
diplomatic channels."109 If another member decides to grant a license for an
"identical transaction within three years," it has to inform the member state
that previously denied the license and provide that state with reasons for
the issuance of the license in question.110 The denials and the consultations
regarding these denials, according to the EU Code of Conduct, should be
done in "confidentiality."111
Various NGOs also argued that there were flaws with the EU Code of
Conduct in general. The most important flaw is that the Code is not legally
binding on the EU member states.112 Amnesty International in a 2004 report
argued that the Code had various weaknesses, such as containing language
very open to interpretation, a review mechanism that was not transparent
enough, and no provisions for arms brokering, which in turn, created seri
ous loopholes in the Code.113

106. Id.
107. Id.
108. Wade Boese, Arms Control Assoc, European Union Adopts Code of Conduct on Arms
Sales, available at http://www.armscontrol.org/act/1998_05/wb2my98asp.
109. SIPRI, EU Code of Conduct for Arms Exports, supra note 104.
110. Id.
111. Id.
112. Oxfam, The EU Code of Conduct on the Arms Trade, Final Analysis Statement on Behalf
of Oxfam, Christian Aid, Saferworld, Amnesty International, BASIC and WDM (1998),
available at http://www.oxfam.org.uk/what_we_do/issues/conflict_disasters/conflict_eu
rocode_final.htm; Amnesty International, Undermining Global Security: The European Union's
Arms Exports (2004), available at http://www.iansa.org/regions/europe/documents/under
min i ng_security/f laws_eu.htm.
113. Amnesty International, EU Code of Conduct on Arms Exports, Criterion Two, AI Index:
IOR61/007/2004 (14 Apr. 2004) available at http://web.amnesty.org/library/lndex/ENGI
OR610072004?open&of=ENG-390.

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378 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

Furthermore, transparency and coordination problems have plagued

the Code from its inception. It has been argued that because member states
inform each other about the denials through "diplomatic channels" and "in
confidentiality," rather than publicly, this further limits the transparency of
the arms exports.114 In the first five years of the EU Code of Conduct, for
example, the Code did not even have a central database for denials issued
for export licenses. The establishment of such a database was declared one
of the goals in December 2003 in the Fifth Annual Report According to
Operative Provisions 8 of the European Union Code of Conduct on Arms
Exports. The very same Annual Report accepted that "there is still work to be
done," especially in the harmonization of reporting procedures and creation
of a comparable statistical database.115

C. Principles Governing Conventional Arms Transfers adopted by the

Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) (1993)

The OSCE Principles, like other international agreements, are not binding.
These principles simply recommend that the OSCE member states "exercise due
restraint" through their national arms export control laws when transferring
arms to other countries and "take into account... the respect for human rights
and fundamental freedoms in the recipient country."116 The OSCE Principles
instruct the participating states to "avoid transfers which would be likely to
be used for the violation or suppression of human rights and fundamental
freedoms."117 The OSCE Principles also assume member states will "reflect"
these principles in their national codes regulating arms transfers.
The analysis of the domestic and international laws governing arms
transfers of major supplier indicates that the real problem is not the absence
of laws or codes. Rather, coupled with various transparency problems, the
real problem is the ambiguous wording of these laws, which in turn creates
serious loopholes for arms traders and officials issuing export licenses. Do
national and international laws that both stipulate and encourage states to
consider human rights in the recipient country work at all?

114. See Bernardo Mariani & Angus Urquhart, Transparency and Accountability in European Arms
Exports Controls: Towards Common Standards and Best Practice (2000), available at http://
www.saferworld.org.uk/publications/pubtrans.htm.
115. SIPRI, Fifth Annual Report According to Operative Provisions 8 of the European Union Code of
Conduct on Arms Exports (2003), available at http://projects.sipri.se/expcon/EU_Code_Re
port5.pdf.
116. Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, Principles Governing Conventional
Arms Transfers (1993), available at http://www.osce.org/documents/fsc/1993/11/4269_
en.pdf.
117. Id.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 379

Sometimes the media and the NGOs end up playing an important

role by disclosing some of these controversial arms transfers to the public.
In particular, the British media and NGOs have been quite critical of the
current Labour government that promised "an ethical foreign policy" dur
ing their election campaigns but then made several controversial deals.
In May 2002, according to a report that appeared in The Independent,
British cabinet members were allegedly involved in persuading the Indian
government to purchase ?1 billion worth of Hawk fighter jets, despite the
Kashmir conflict.118 The same report also mentioned that British jets sold to
Indonesia were used during the conflict in East Timor in July 1999.119 In July
2002, the United Kingdom was plunged into a controversial debate when
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw announced his government's intention to "'modif[y]'
. . . the rules on arms sales to reflect the 'new reality' of the multinational
defence projects."120 Concurrently, British Prime Minister Tony Blair was
accused of damaging the Kashmir talks by selling arms to both sides, he
brushed these accusations aside by saying that "the idea that we shut down
our defence industry in these circumstances I find bizarre."121
In Belgium, a country party to the Code, but not on the top ten suppliers
list, the revelation of arms sales to Nepal in July 2002, a country with a poor
human rights record, created a huge scandal. This scandal had two important
consequences. First, it led to the resignation of the Finance Minister Magda
Alvoet. Second, Belgium in October 2002 became the first EU country to
make the EU Code of Conduct on Arms Exports a domestic law.122
Several controversial arms transfers by the United States have also re
ceived considerable media and NGO attention. For example, the possible
sale of $3.5 billion worth of 145 Super Cobra attack helicopters to Turkey
in the recent past was one such example.
In summary, given these lax domestic laws and international codes and
regimes, it is difficult to expect that arms transfers to countries with poor
human rights records will completely halt. However, in addition to the laws
that govern arms transfers, the changing nature of the global arms market
following the Cold War has complicated the situation.

118. Paul Eavis, Analysis Arms Trade-A Question That Won't Go Away for Labour-Is It Ethical
to Sell Arms to Countries At War?, Indep., 28 May 2002.
119. Id.
120. Jason Beattie, Government Under Fire on Arms Sales, Scotsman, 8 July 2002.
121. Id. For other criticisms, see, e.g., Andrew Parker, Ethical Dimension to be Pursued if
Granted More Time, Fin. Times, 25 May 2001.
122. Adam, supra note 7.

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380 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

VI. THE CHANGING NATURE OF THE POST-COLD WAR GLOBAL

ARMS MARKET

A recent Amnesty International report concluded that "it is short term profit
making and political advantage that guide the bulk of the international arms
trade."123 That "profit" stems from the fact that arms trade is a big business for
some countries. According to SIPRI estimates, despite the decline following
the end of the Cold War, between 1995 and 2004, the annual world military
expenditure has continued to fluctuate between $800 and $950 billion.124
Of this amount, it is estimated that approximately $26 to $34 billion was
spent globally on conventional arms trade in 2002.125
The end of the Cold War has, however, twisted this "profit" scheme by
leading to a decline in the domestic military expenditures of almost all of
the top ten suppliers.126 Although this downturn started to rebound around
1998, most of the major supplier countries have not been able to return to
their Cold War military expenditure levels.127 In addition to this decline in
military expenditures, "profit" concerns that were relegated to a secondary
role in arms transfers during the Cold War because of strategic concerns
became more important than ever when the Cold War ended.128 These
changes had two important consequences. First, the arms market ended
up becoming a buyer's market.129 Second, in order to offset this decline
in military expenditures and to realize economic benefits, some supplier
countries and manufacturers in these countries have started to pursue more
aggressive policies in their international sales.130 For example, since the

123. Amnesty International, A Catalogue of Failures: G8 Arms Exports and Human Rights Violations,
supra note 9.
124. SIPRI, SIPRI Military Expenditure Database, available at http://www.sipri.org/contents/mi
lap/milex/mex_world_graph.html; SIPRI, Recent Trends in Military Expenditure, available
at http://www.sipri.org/contents/milap/milex/mex_trends.html.
125. According to SIPRI Yearbook 2004, which takes into account only actual deliveries,
annual global arms trade in 2002 was somewhere between $26 and $34 billion. See
SIPRI Yearbook 2004, supra note 18, at 469. For 2003, Richard F. Grimmet estimated
that the value of arms agreements was $25.6 billion. Richard F. Grimmet, Congressional
Research Service, Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations, 1996-2003, at CRS-3
(2003), available at www.fas.org/man/crs/RL32547.pdf.
126. For data for each of these countries, see SIPRI, The SIPRI Military Expenditure Database,
available at http://first.sipri.org/non_first/result_milex.php?send.
127. SIPRI, Recent Trends in Military Expenditure, available at http://www.sipri.org/contents/
milap/milex/mex_trends.html.
128. World Economic and Social Survey 169 (1997), available at http://web.nps.navy.mil/
~relooney/3040_2htm.
129. William H?rtung, A Tale of Three Arms Trades: The Changing Dynamics of Conventional
Weapons Proliferation, 1991-2000, in America's Peace Dividend (Ann Markusen ed., 2000),
available at http://www.ciaonet.org/book/markusen/hartung.html.
130. Janne E. Nolan et al., The Imperatives for Cooperation, in Global Engagement: Cooperation
and Security in the 2 1st Century 19, 25 (Janne E. Nolan ed., 1994); Keith Krause, Arms and
the State: Patterns of Military Production and Trade 125 (1992); Ian Anthony et al., The
Trade in Major Conventional Weapons, in SIPRI Yearbook 1995: Armament, Disarmament
and International Security 502 [hereinafter SIPRI Yearbook 1995].

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 381

early 1990s, the US government not only continued to give loans to foreign
government on favorable terms so that they could purchase American arms
but also encouraged American embassies abroad to lend greater support
to businesses involved in selling arms around the world.131 The situation in
Russia, on the other hand, was more dire. The collapse of the Soviet Union
and the structural changes that took place in the arms market following the
end of the Cold War damaged the Soviet military-industrial complex, which
constituted one of the main pillars of the overall Soviet economy.132 Overall,
the end of the Cold War created a buyer's market in which arms supplies
and suppliers became more abundant; outbidding other supplier countries
became the norm more than ever.
One clear example of this outbidding can be seen in arms transfers
to China. By becoming the major supplier of conventional arms to China
since the start of the US and European arms embargo in 1989, Russian arms
sales to China have substantially reduced the impact of these sanctions.
Consequently, along with China, some major arms supplier countries such
as France and Germany have called for the lifting of the EU sanctions.
In December 2003, the spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry stated
that "the EU embargo against China on military sales does not conform with
the good momentum in [sic] the development of relations between China
and Europe."133 French President Jacques Chirac, German Chancellor Ger
hard Schroeder, EU High Representative for Common Foreign and Security
Policy Javier Solana, and EU Commissioner for External Affairs Christopher
Patten approached the issue quite sympathetically. Even France issued a
four-page document calling for "the establishment of a genuine 'strategic
partnership' [that] presupposes the abandonment of a rational based on
rewards and sanctions."134
However, the European Commission has been unwilling to lift the em
bargo.135 The spokeswoman for the EU Commission argued that the Chinese

131. William W. Keller, Arm in Arm: The Political Economy of Global Arms Trade 90-92 (1995);
Charles M. Sennott, Arms Deals Criticized as Corporate US Welfare, Boston Globe, 14 Jan.
2003; see, e.g., The White House Office of the Press Secretary, Fact Sheet: Conventional
Arms Transfer Policy (17 Feb. 1995), available at www.fas.org/asmp/resources/govern/
whfacts.html, stating:
Once an approval for a transfer is made, the U.S. Government will provide support for the pro
posed U.S. export. In those cases the United States will take such steps as tasking our overseas
mission personnel to support overseas marketing efforts of American companies bidding on
defense contracts, actively involving senior government officials in promoting sales of particular
importance to the United States.

132. Krause, supra note 130, at 121; John Berryman, Russia and the Illicit Arms Trade, 33
Crime, L. & Soc. Change 85 (2000).
133. AFP: PRC FM Spokesman Urges EU To Lift Arms Embargo Against China, Agence France
Presse, 18 Dec. 2003, FBIS-CHI-2003-12-18; EU Considers Lifting Arms Embargo on
China, Xinhua, 26 Jan. 2004, FBIS-CHI-2004-0126.
134. French Report Examines Dispute with US Over Embargo on Arms Sales to China, Le
Monde, 12 Mar. 2004.
135. China Urges EU to Lift Arms Embargo, EU Bus., 29 Sept. 2004, available at http://www.
eubusiness.com/archive/afp/040930045047.xpkl2mnc.

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 382 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

would need to demonstrate very clearly that progress has been made in human
rights protection before a lifting of the arms embargo can be considered.136 The
Commission turned down the proposal to lift the embargo on China several
times recently.137 In a similar fashion, the Bush administration has also opposed
the removal of the sanctions.138 However, this American concern does not stem
from human rights conditions in China. Rather, President Bush has stated that
his main interest was to keep the arms race between China and Taiwan in
balance.139 As the Chinese example demonstrates, while the improvement in
human rights conditions is debatable in China, the major suppliers are more
than willing to replace each other in arms transfers. The EU and the United
States initiated the embargo; but Russian arms transfers to China have effectively
undermined it, creating frustration among some of the EU countries that would
appreciate a client like China. Interestingly enough, while lifting the embargo
against China was being debated in November 2005, the EU imposed arms
sanctions on Uzbekistan following the harsh suppression of the Andijan riots
that took place in May 2005.140 Although these sanctions can be considered
a way to show the EU's good intentions on human rights, as some observers
have noted, it is doubtful that the embargo will make any difference. This is
simply because Uzbekistan relies on Russia, China, and other non-European
countries rather than EU countries for its military supplies.141 Yet, the fact that
some EU members are quite willing to lift the sanctions for China but will go
after Uzbekistan raises serious doubts about the EU's human rights concerns
in arms exports.

VIL THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN: SMALL ARMS, NON-MAJOR

SUPPLIERS, AND BLACK AND GRAY MARKETS

Most well-known records of global arms transfers, such as the SIPRI Yearbooks
and the Grimmett Report, do not cover two important issues regarding arms

136 AFP: PRC FM Spokesman Urges EU To Lift Arms Embargo Against China, supra note 133.
137. EU Snubs Paris Over Arms for Beijing: The French Wants to Lift the Embargo, Central
News Agency, 27 Jan. 2004, FBIS-CHI-2004-0127; EU Presidency Sources Admits EU
Remains Divided Over Arms Embargo on China, Agence France Presse, 23 Apr. 2004,
FBIS-CHI-2004-0423.
138. Chirac Defies Bush on China Arms, 22 Feb. 2005, available at http://news.bbc.co.Uk/1/hi/
world/europe/4288067.stm; Bush Warns EU Not to Lift China Arms Ban, 23 Feb. 2005,
available at http://www.newsmax.eom/archives/articles/2005/2/22/171537.shtml.
139. Rob Gifford, Bush Criticizes EU Plans to Lift China Arms Embargo, 23 Feb. 2005, ava/7
able at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyld=4509590.
140. Council Common Position 2005/792/CFSP of 14 November 2005 Concerning Restrictive
Measures Against Uzbekistan, 2005 Official J. EU (L299) 72-79, available at http://www.
sipri.org/contents/expcon/2005-1114euembuzb.pdf.
141. C. J. Chivers, EU Sanctions on Uzbekistan, Int'l Herald Trib., 3 Oct. 2005, available at
http://www.iht.eom/articles/2005/10/03/news/uzbek.php#; Doubt About Effectiveness
of the European Union Sanctions Against Usbekistan [sic], 6 Oct. 2005, available at
http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=http://www.dw-world.de/dw/ar
ticle/0,1564,1732650,00.html&prev=/search%3Fq%3D.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 383

transfers: small arms; and illegal and illicit markets, also known as the black
and gray markets, respectively. Compared to the rest of the arms transfers,
small arms transfers are lesser in value but are much more accessible by
countries with poor human rights records or conflict, which in turn makes the
competition in global arms trade tougher. According to the latest estimates
of the Small Arms Survey, the value of annual global legal exports of small
arms is somewhere between $2.4 billion and $4 billion.142
The largest legal exporters of small arms are the United States, Italy,
Belgium, Germany, Russia, Brazil, and China. Although the exports from
these countries are primarily for use in the Western markets, an unspecified
amount of arms makes its way to countries such as Saudi Arabia, Colom
bia, Algeria, Bangladesh, Iran, Vietnam, Malaysia, Bhutan, Indonesia, and
Ethiopia.143
In the case of small arms, major suppliers not only face competition from
other major suppliers, but from second and third world countries as well.
Since the late 1970s and early 1980s, some second and third world countries,
as well as some of the former communist countries of Central and Eastern
Europe, have entered the global arms market, particularly in small arms.
Although they were not initially successful in exporting on a large scale,
second and third world countries have gradually managed to supply small arms
to other third world countries.144 However, the changing structure of the
global arms market following the end of the Cold War led to a contraction
in the domestic markets in small arms in Central and Eastern Europe, just as
it did elsewhere. Coupled with this contraction in the domestic markets,
Central and Eastern European countries inherited surplus arms that were left
by withdrawing Soviet troops.145 These excess arms forced these countries to
find new markets abroad, sometimes illegally and illicitly.146 Small arms were
either secretly exported to nationally or internationally embargoed destina
tions; or in the case of illicit transfers, these arms ended up in countries that
were not the legal destinations stated in the end-user certificates. Thus, while
the dark side of the global arms trade is small arms trade, the darker side is
the illegal and illicit small arms trade, estimated at $1 billion annually.147

142. Back to the Sources: International Small Arms Transfers, in Small Arms Survey 2004,
available at http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/Yearbook%202004/2004%20press%20kit
chap.04.pdf.
143. Id.
144. Michael Brzoska, The Nature and Dimension of the Problem, in Transparency in Interna
tional Arms Transfers 19-20 (1990).
145. Berryman, supra note 132, at 87-88.
146. Workshops and Factories: Products and Producers, in Small Arms Survey 2003, at ch. 1
(2003), available at www.smallarmssurvey.org/Yearbook%202003/yb2003_en_presskit_
ch1 .pdf; Combating the Illicit Arms Trade, available at www.csd.bg/fileSrc.php?id=414;
Human Rights Watch, Ripe for Reform: Stemming Slovakia's Arms Trade with Human Rights
Abusers (2004), available at www.hrw.org/reports/2004/slovakia0204/.
147. Insights and Mysteries: Global Small Arms Transfers, in Small Arms Survey 2003, at ch.
3 (2003), available at http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/Yearbook%202003/yb2003_en_
presskit_ch3.pdf.

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384 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

These second and third tier supplier countries do not dominate the global
arms market and thus do not get ranked in the major suppliers list; but their
arms, especially small arms and light weapons that are more suitable for
the wars waged in the post-Cold War world, eventually find their way to
unstable parts of the world.148 For example, it was not only major suppliers
such as the French, the Belgians, and the Russians that sold arms and ammu
nition to Rwanda before the genocide in 1994, but also a number of former
communist countries such as Romania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, and
Slovakia.149 Advocacy groups published numerous reports in the late 1990s
and the early 2000s documenting the illicit arms trade from countries such
as the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bulgaria, and South Africa. An HRW report
published in 2004 detailed arms sales to countries such as Uganda and An
gola involving Slovak firms and individuals in the early 2000s.150 Similarly,
different reports issued by HRW in 2001 and Transparency International in
2003 criticized the Czech Republic for selling tanks to Yemen and arms to
Sri Lanka, Angola, and Zimbabwe.151 In 2002, the Christian Science Monitor
disclosed an arms smuggling ring in the Czech republic, which was illicitly
transferring arms to Iraq.152 Another HRW report issued in 1999, as well as
various other reports, accused the Bulgarian government of turning a blind
eye on the arms sent to various conflict zones around the world.153 There
were also claims that Serbia and Ukraine had sold arms to Iraq in the early
2000s in defiance of the UN embargo on that country.154 Moreover, the

148. Brzoska, supra note 144; Michael T. Klare, The Subterranean Arms Trade: Black Market
Sales, Covert Operations and Ethnic Warfare, in Cascade of Arms: Managing Conventional
Weapons Proliferation 43 (Andrew J. Pierre ed., 1997).
149. Stephen D. Goose & Frank Smyth, Arming Genocide in Rwanda, For. Aff., Sept.-Oct.
1994.
150. Human Rights Watch, Ripe for Reform: Stemming Slovakia's Arms Trade with Human Rights
Abusers, supra note 146; Human Rights Watch, The Evolution of Slovakia's Arms Trade
Controls and the Need for Further Reforms, in Ripe for Reform: Stemming Slovakia's Arms
Trade with Human Rights Abusers (2004), available at http://www.hrw.org/reports/2004/slo
vakia0204/5.htm#_Toc61081342.
151. Czech Cabinet Spokesman Explains Premier's Statement on Arms Export, Prague CTK,
20 Apr. 2001, FBIS-EEU-2001-0420; Arms Export Control in Czech Republic, Slovakia
Criticized By HRW, Prague CTK, 21 Nov. 2001, FBIS-EEU-2001 -1122; Human Rights Watch,
World Report 2002, at Czech Republic (2002), available atwww.hrw.org/wr2k2/europe8.
html; Transparency International Faults Lack of Control Over Czech Arms Exports, Lidov
Noviny, 7 Oct. 2003, FBIS-EEU-2003-1009.
152. Arie Farnam, Iraq Buying Arms in East Europe's Black Markets, Christian Sei. Mon., 11
Sept. 2002.
153. Human Rights Watch, A Review of Bulgarian Arms Trade (1999), available at http://www.hrw.
org/reports/1999/bulgaria/Bulga994-01.htm#P294_52761; Jeffrey P. Bialos, The Bulgarian
Defense Industry: Strategic Option for Transformation, Reorientation and NATO Integration 3
(2001). Another recent report on Bulgarian arms exports put the total exports of military
goods of this country at $80 million in 2002, $30 of which were exports of small arms.
See, e.g., Bulgarian NGO Reports on Declining Arms Exports, Smuggling, 24 Chasa, 5
Apr. 2004, FBIS-EEU-2004-04-05.
154. CNN, Yugoslavia 'Sold Arms to Iraq,' 23 Oct. 2002, available at http://archives.cnn.com/
2002/WORLD/europe/10/23/yugoslavia.iraq/; Wade Boese, U.S. Says Ukrainian President

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 2006 Guns and Human Rights 385

unrecognized Transdniestrian Republic in Moldova is said to have five or

six facilities producing "small arms, mortars and missile-launchers, for sale
to the world's trouble-spots/'155
Another way non-major suppliers are involved in arms transfers to
countries with imperfect human rights records is with the reselling of arms.
These non-major suppliers, apart from selling arms manufactured in their
countries, operate as part of the global gray and black market networks,
reselling arms purchased from major supplier countries. In 2001 it was
reported that the Democratic Republic of Congo and Namibia were selling
arms that they had purchased from France to their neighbor Zimbabwe, a
country embargoed due to its poor human rights record.156 In 2003, Global
Witness, an environmental organization, reported that Chinese-manufactured
AK-47s and other arms were shipped to Liberia from Hong Kong ports in
return for Liberian timber exports.157
Although the picture created by the non-major suppliers is bleak, there
have been recent changes in the laws that regulate arms transfers in these
countries. These countries began to pass legislation that will, at least on
paper, either prohibit sales to human right violators or conflict zones or
make arms sales more transparent. For example, in late 2002, South Africa,
whose client list in the late 1990s included countries such as Algeria, An
gola, Congo, Egypt, India, Colombia, and Israel,158 officially established a
National Arms Control Committee that would monitor conventional arms
sales.159 The Czech Deputy Foreign Minister claimed that the Czech govern
ment had "altered the method of issuing licenses so that it respects in the

Approved Arms Sale to Iraq, Arms Control Today, Oct. 2002, available at http://www.
armscontrol.org/act/2002_10/ukraineoct02.asp?print.
155. The Hazards of a Long, Hard Freeze; Former Soviet War Zones, Economist, 21 Aug. 2004,
at 41-43.
156. Zimbabwe Reportedly Amassing Arms Ahead of Election; Namibia, DRC Implicated,
Fin. Gaz., 18 Oct. 2001, FBIS-AFR-2001-1018.
157. AFP: Report Claims Hong Kong Linked to Illegal Arms Trade in Liberia, Agence France
Presse, 11 May 2003, FBIS-CHI-2003-0511.
158. Editorial, RSA Paper Castigates State Over Arms Sales Decisions, Cape Town Die Burger,
2 Feb. 1999, FBIS-AFR-1999-0302; Contradiction Seen in New RSA Arms Program,
Johannesburg Business Day, 22 Dec. 1999, FBIS-AFR-1999-1222.
159. RSA: National Assembly Approves Bill to Control Arms Sales, Johannesburg Sapa, 20 Aug.
2002, FBIS-AFR-2002-0820; RSA: National Council of Provinces Passes "Controversial"
Arms Control Bill, Johannesburg Sapa, 1 7 Oct. 2002, FBIS-AFR-2002-101 7. Yet in February
2004, at the height of Haitian crises, the South African President authorized a shipment
containing rifles, bullets, smoke grenades, and bullet-proof vests to Haiti without the ap
proval of the Parliament, causing an uproar in that country. Haiti Arms Row Rocks South
Africa, BBC News, available at news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3513006.stm; RSA: Opposition
DA Leader Urges Government to Stop Shipment of Arms to Haiti, Johannesburg Sapa 28
Feb. 2004, FBIS-LAT-2004-0228. Yet the South African government rejected the fact that
the shipments reached Haiti. DA Digs Deeper in Haiti Saga, BBC News, 5 Mar. 2004,
available at www.news24.com/News24/South_Africa/News/0?2-7-1442_1494104,00.
html.

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386 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

best possible way the requirements of the [EU] Code/'160 Consequently, in

2004, the Czech government reported that it canceled the sale of a radar
system to China along with nine other items.161 Likewise, in 2002, Bulgaria
and Slovakia adopted bills to regulate arms exports from their countries.
However an HRW report argued that these reforms were far from effective in
decreasing the violations in arms exports from these countries.162 It is quite
doubtful that these new laws in the second tier supplier countries will be
any more effective than those in the major supplier countries.

VIII. CONCLUSION: WHAT IS TO BE DONE?

This article examined the current state of the arms export control policies
of major supplier countries, as well as arms exports to countries with poor
human rights conditions. It began by detailing the top suppliers and the laws,
both at the domestic and international levels, that they were subjected to
while transferring arms globally. As this article has illustrated, most of the
countries that rank as top suppliers are either "bound" or "encouraged" by
law to pay attention to human rights conditions in recipient countries.
Unfortunately, despite all these restrictions, as illustrated in Figure 2, five
of the top ten recipients are classified as Not Free or Partly Free countries
by Freedom House. Amongst the top sixty recipients, which accounts for
almost 96 percent of the conventional arms globally transferred, the total
number of countries with poor human rights is thirty. To make things worse,
of these thirty, twelve countries not only have poor human rights records
but are also involved in some form of conflict.
Overall, as illustrated in Figure 3, it can be argued that laws, espe
cially at the domestic level, could be effective in curbing major suppliers'
enthusiasm in selling arms to countries with poor human rights records or
with conflict. When the dominance of the United States and Russia in the
global arms market is compared, Russia, with no domestic laws stipulating
or encouraging it to take human rights into consideration, has a diversified

160. Pavel Baroch, Defense Industry Criticizes Czech Authorities for Complicating Arms
Exports, Prague Hospodarske Noviny, 30 Aug. 2004, FBIS-EEU-2004-0901.
161. Czech Ministry Bans Nine Arms Exports in 2004, Czech CTK, 31 Aug. 2004, FBIS-EEU
2004-0831.
162. Human Rights Watch, Arms Trade, Human Rights, and European Union Enlargement The Record
of Candidate Countries (2002), available at http://www.hrw.org/backgrounder/arms/eu_brief
ing.htm. Human Rights Watch, The Case for Further Reform, in Ripe for Reform: Stemming
Slovakia's Arms Trade with Human Rights Abusers, supra note 146, available at http://www.
hrw.org/reports/2004/slovakia0204/5.htm#_Toc61081342. In the mean time, in January
2004, the Bulgarian government added Iraq, Congo, and Liberia to its list of countries to
which Bulgarian arms exports were prohibited. See, e.g., Bulgarian Government Updates
Arms Export Blacklist, Sofia Bta, 22 Jan. 2004, FBIS-EEU-2004-0122.

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2006 Guns and Human Rights 387

client portfolio catering to twenty different countries with poor human rights
records while supplying 30 percent of the arms transferred globally during
the same period. In contrast, the United States, which supplied 34 percent
of global arms, had only nine clients with poor human rights records. So,
what can be done to make supplier states rigorously follow the rules so that
national and internal laws and regulations do not simply remain words on
paper?
In terms of strengthening legal regimes, several Nobel Laureates, headed
by former Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, have been working since 1997
on an International Code of Conduct.163 So far, the development of this Code
has been slow.164 The proposed code aims to create an international code
without the interpretive language of the existing codes by making recipient
countries meet certain human rights criteria in order to be eligible to receive
arms. In other words, the goal of the International Code of Conduct is to
prohibit all arms sales to countries "unless" they respect human rights. This
language is quite contrary to other existing international codes that allow
sales "except" in the cases in which there are "clear risks" of human rights
violations.165
Recently, NGOs have started to play an important role in the shaping of
arms control agendas. Their role, especially in the creation and implementa
tion of the Ottawa Treaty, which banned antipersonnel landmines, has already
been the subject of several studies.166 In the case of conventional weapons,
NGOs continue to be the watchdogs of states that apply laws liberally. In
October 2003, three major advocacy groups, Amnesty International, Oxfam,
and the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA), initiated a
campaign for the signing of an international treaty that would provide bet
ter control of global arms trade.167 These advocacy groups also continue to
criticize the practices of major supplier states. The Amnesty International
report issued in December 2003 argued that G8 countries, most of which
are major supplier countries, fail to put any effort into creating a "coordina

163. Merrill Goozner, Nobel Laureates Press to Curb World Arms Trade; Peace Prize Winners
Come Together to Issue a Call for an International Code of Conduct, Chi. Trib., 29 May
1997, at N4.
164. Europa World, An International Code for Arms Transfers, available at http://www.europa
world.org/issue6/intcodearmtrans271000.htm; Stop the Terror Trade: The Commission
of Nobel Peace Laureates' Initiative to Control Arms Transfers, available at http://www.
arias.or.cr/fundarias/cpr/armslaw/declaration.html.
165. Id.
166. Kenneth R. Rutherford, The Evolving Arms Control Agenda: Implications of the Role of
the NGOs in Banning Antipersonnel Landmines, 53 World Pol. 74 (2000).
167. Press Release, Oxfam, The International Human Rights Day Sees World Support Build
for International Arms Trade Treaty (10 Dec. 2003), available at http://www.oxfam.org.
uk/press/releases/controlarms_humanrights.htm. See e.g., Control Arms Campaign, avail
able at http://www.controlarms.org.

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 388 HUMAN RIGHTS QUARTERLY Vol. 28

tion mechanism" among the group and instead place the "responsibility"
on recipient countries.168
In 2005, the idea of an international arms treaty gained speed one
more time. In March 2005, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw declared
his country's intention to establish an international arms treaty within the
United Notions.169 Following this, in October 2005, the Council of the Eu
ropean Union "acknowledged the support, in all parts of the world, for an
international treaty to establish common standards for the global trade in
conventional arms."170 The Council also stated that the platform for such a
trade should be the United Nations.171
Given the competitive nature of the current arms market, it is doubtful
that major suppliers would be willing to embrace an international code
with real and stringent controls on their arms exports. Furthermore, the US
strategy following 11 September 2001, which has been to build "coalitions"
at all cost, has resulted in the lifting of sanctions to countries such as India,
Pakistan, Azerbaijan, and Tajikistan and the increase of arms transfers to many
other countries with dubious human rights records, creates doubts about the
intentions of the great powers.172 These recent developments demonstrate
that what the world needs is a change in mentality more than a change
in codes. Arms transfers to countries with poor human rights records have
opportunity costs in terms of human and international security. Arms in
the wrong hands likely worsen human rights conditions and curtail human
development by draining precious resources in the recipient country. As the
world witnessed during the first Gulf War, in Afghanistan, and elsewhere,
weapons can just as well be used against supplier countries.

1 68. Amnesty International, A Catalogue of Failures: G8 Arms Exports and Human Rights Violations,
supra note 9.
169. Friends Committee on National Legislation, Questions and Answers on the Proposed
Arms Trade Treaty, available at http://www.fcnl.org/issues/item.php?item_id=1426&issue_
?d=47.
170. Friends Committee on National Legislation, Council Conclusions on an International
Treaty on the Arms Trade, available at http://www.fcnl.org/pdfs/ATT_EUCommission.
pdf.
171. Id.
172. Sibylle Bauer, Arms Exports Post 9/11 and the Flood Gates Open?, 11 Eur. Security Rev.
6-7 (2002).

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