Right from the start, the new traffic light government gives the green light for arms deals worth billions. But there is one important difference from before.
In the first seven weeks of its term in office, the new federal government approved arms exports worth 2.2 billion euros. That is almost as much as in the first half of 2021 with 2.3 billion euros.
However, 99.9 percent of the weapons of war and other military goods go to members of the European Union, NATO and equivalent countries such as Australia, Japan and New Zealand, as the German Press Agency learned from government circles on Monday. The proportion of weapons of war is 82 percent.
For the Netherlands alone, the delivery of artillery ammunition of various calibers for ammunition depots and firing ranges worth 1.79 billion euros has been approved, it said. It is followed by Australia (207.6 million euros), the USA (60.5 million) and Great Britain (37.1 million).
Only 0.1 percent of exports to third countries
For so-called third countries outside the EU and NATO, exports were only approved for 2.35 million euros – 0.1 percent of the total volume. Arms deliveries to such countries are particularly controversial because of the involvement of some of these states in regional conflicts and for human rights reasons. Last year, the old government approved arms worth 4.35 billion euros for Egypt alone, even though the country is involved in the conflicts in Yemen and Libya.
The Parliamentary State Secretary in the Ministry of Economic Affairs responsible for arms exports, Sven Giegold (Greens), emphasized that no war weapons had been delivered to third countries. He justified the billions in exports to EU countries with close European cooperation on security and defense issues. “An expression of this partnership is that we supply each other with armaments within Europe and with our allies,” he told the dpa. The new government has not yet issued any permits for arms deliveries to developing countries.
Old government broke arms export record
Last year, shortly before the change of government, the government of the Union and the SPD set an arms export record with approvals for deals worth billions. Deliveries totaling EUR 9.35 billion were approved around the world, more than ever before. The increase compared to the previous year was 61 percent, the previous record value of 2019 was exceeded by more than one billion euros.
9.04 billion euros went back to approvals from the old federal government until the change of government on December 8th. The new traffic light coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP only allowed exports for 309 million euros in the first three weeks until the turn of the year.
Since the beginning of the year, however, the permits have increased sharply. By January 23, exports were allowed for a further almost 1.9 billion euros. If you extrapolate that for the year, there would be another new record. However, the export permits are subject to strong fluctuations. In 2021, for example, exports for 2.3 billion euros were approved in the first half of the year, but then for more than six billion euros in the second half of the year.
Habeck plans control law
The new federal government has taken up the cause of a restrictive arms export policy and intends to underpin this claim with a control law later this year. The new Economics and Climate Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) is responsible for this. The main aim is to restrict exports to third countries. Last year, the proportion of arms exports approved for these states rose from 50.1 to 63.6 percent.
Source: Stern
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