Country Report from SPAS on the Swedish Arms Trade Report to the ENAAT-Meeting in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, May 2010

Country report from SPAS on the Swedish arms trade Report to the ENAAT-meeting in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, May 2010. By Pamela Baarman, Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society (SPAS) The negative trend continues in Sweden regarding arms export; during 2009 Sweden exported arms for over 1,4 billion Euros, according to ISP, the Swedish Agency for Non-Proliferation and Export Controls. Never before has Sweden exported more arms than last year - the export has increased with seven per cent in only one year, and has more than quadrupled in the last eight years. This year's high numbers are said to be due to the export of large weapon systems, like the Combat Vehicle 90 to the Netherlands and Denmark, the fighter jet Jas 39 Gripen to South Africa and the radar system Erieye to Pakistan, where the contracts have been signed years ago but the products only now being delivered. What is disappointing is that Sweden continues to export weapons to states of dubious character, where breaches of human rights are frequent. Pakistan was the third largest importer of Swedish arms in 2009, with an import of more than 140 million Euros in 2009. No new contracts are accepted by the ISP to Pakistan today, but the supplemental deliveries continue. SPAS has long been demanding that these supplemental deliveries need to be stopped immediately to all countries where breaches of human rights are frequent, countries like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. Unfortunately the large export seems to be continuing in the future, even with a new government possibly being elected in September. According to statistics from Sipri, Sweden is now the tenth largest arms exporter in the world. 10 largest export destinations (million SEK) 2009 1 The Netherlands 2 479,4 2 South Africa 1 755,1 3 Pakistan 1 412,3 4 Finland 953,8 5 The UK 931,9 6 India 900,9 7 USA 638,2 8 Denmark 582,2 9 Germany 464,4 10 France 458,5 10 largest export destinations 2005-2009 (million SEK) 1 South Africa 8 052 2 The Netherlands 7 037 3 Pakistan 4 161 4 USA 4 016 5 Finland 3 819 6 Denmark 3 283 7 Germany 2 854 8 France 2 749 9 India 2 295 10 Greece 2 260 Total 40 526 Swedish produced arms gone missing A wide debate rose in the media in July 2009 after some Swedish AT4 anti-armour rockets were found among the Farc guerrilla in Colombia. The rockets had originally been exported to Venezuela, which highlighted the problem of actually being able to control the final destination of arms, end-user certificate or not. The ISP finally decided to stop all further export to Venezuela. The debate continued after the Swedish Fellowship of Reconciliation alerted the media that in Somalia, footage had been found where the Islamic al-Shabaab militia were using the Swedish grenade launcher Carl Gustaf, produced by Saab Bofors Dynamics. Jas 39 Gripen The Swedish government continues to push hard for the export of Jas Gripen. In 2009, South Africa chose - after some ruthless marketing being done by the Swedish government – to buy Swedish arms for 170 million Euros. Afterwards, serious questions have been raised about suspected corruption with this contract. In June 2009 the Swedish prosecutor decided to stop the preliminary investigation regarding suspected bribery in the sales of Jas Gripen to South Africa, the Czech Republic and Hungary. Later the same month, SPAS demanded the Attorney General to investigate whether it was the lacking police resources that resulted in the stopped investigation. The Attorney General came to the conclusion, which was published in April 2010, that the police should in fact have allocated more resources to the Jas investigation, and that it could be discussed whether at all the police prioritised the case in accordance with obligations derived from international conventions. SPAS now argues for the whole investigation to be re-opened as soon as possible. In December 2009 Sweden had to explain itself before the OECD working group against bribes, and rumour has it Sweden had to endure strong criticism from the OECD. SPAS tried to acquire this information but it has been termed classified. Sweden has also markedly scaled up its push to sell the Jas Gripen to Brazil. Not only government officials, but even the king and queen of Sweden and the Swedish Industrial & Metal Worker's Union are pulling together to secure the deal for Sweden. Brazil is looking to buy 36 new fighters at first, with an option to acquire an additional 100 in the future. The Brazilian Air Force is said to prefer the Swedish jets above Dassault's Rafale fighter and Boeing's F/A-18 Super Hornet, but political aspects may well result in one of the others being chosen instead. The decision is expected sometimes this summer. Sweden is also hoping Romania would reconsider their previous decision to buy 24 used F- 16 fighter jets, by offering to sell 24 new Jas Gripen at the same price. Opinion poll In November 2009, on the request of SPAS, an opinion poll was made among Swedes in order to find out what the general public really thinks of Sweden's arms export regulations. A whopping 92 per cent said they'd rather Sweden wouldn't allow arms export to states where serious breaches of human rights occur, 81 per cent considers arms export to countries in war to be wrong, whereas 55 per cent went even further and wouldn't allow arms export to any states at all. The signals couldn't be much clearer; the general public is not accepting the government's current arms export policy. When these results were published, SPAS did a campaign where people via our website could email party leaders, with the question what they aimed to do about the arms export policy, were they to be elected in the next elections. Hundreds of people took the opportunity to demand answers from the politicians, and party leaders from all but two parties did take the time to formulate an answer. Disarmament conference and DefExpo 2010 in New Delhi, India SPAS worked together with 21 civil society organisations in India to arrange a disarmament conference in opposition to the DefExpo 2010 military trade fair in New Delhi. During four days meetings, workshops, peace vigils, a concert and an experts conference were organised. The disarmament conference was meant as an appeal to the Indian government to invest in welfare rather than warfare - the Indian military budget is currently eight times the budget for clean water and sanitation. It is also important to show Swedish arms companies that we are keeping track of their whereabouts even outside Swedish borders. SPAS is currently looking into the possibilities of continuing with this project. The new export promotion authority During last year there were discussions about the government's plans on creating a new export promotion authority for Swedish arms export. In April 2010 it was finally announced that the new authority has been launched with a budget of 3,8 million Euros for the first 6 months. The opposition parties are saying that after a possible victory in the upcoming elections this autumn, they will close down this authority again. Zven and A helping hand In March 2010 SPAS launched a book project together with a few other organisations. The book, called A helping hand, is a fact-based fictional comic book, taking the readers on a journey from Sweden to India on one man's quest to become rich on the sales of a new weapon he's manufactured - the helping hand. In between the comic pages, fact sheets have been inserted to inform the reader about the immorality within the Swedish arms export. The book has been very well received, and is currently being transformed into a theatre show, which will tour high schools later on in the autumn. The main character, named Zven, is also alive on Facebook and has his own blog as a way to draw attention to the book project and the questions of arms export in general. Saudi Arabia Sweden signed a military contract in 2005 with Saudi Arabia. The contract was set to expire in November 2010, but would be automatically renewed unless the government decided to terminate it at least six months in advance. The government, however, decided not to act, saying that it would send the wrong kind of signals to Saudi Arabia. Already back in 2005 the contract resulted in heavy protesting due to the dictatorial Saudi Arabia's lack of respect for freedom of religion or freedom of speech; the ban on political parties, the discrimination against women and the frequent use of the death penalty. The Swedish guidelines for arms export clearly states that Sweden should not export arms to countries where serious breaches of human rights occur, but the ISP had no problem authorising this particular military contract since it was mainly for radar systems, not actual arms. SPAS campaigned unsuccessfully for the contract to be terminated, and has in the media been strongly criticising the unfortunate outcome. Arms export to Sri Lanka SPAS together with the Swedish Sri Lanka Committee and Siemon Wezeman are writing a report on the arms export to Sri Lanka, and the importance of the export for the continuation of the conflict up until May 2009. The report will cover the arms export from the EU and China, at the same time putting the arms export into broader perspectives of the Sri Lankan society. The report will be published later this autumn.

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