Germany launches scheme to monitor end use of arms exports

Source: Xinhua| 2017-08-30 20:10:38|Editor: Song Lifang
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BERLIN, Aug. 30 (Xinhua) -- Germany has begun monitoring the end use of its arms exports in the launch of a new policy, newspaper Rheinische Post reported Wednesday.

"We are assessing whether the weapons delivered are still held by the final user named (during the original transaction)," Andreas Obersteller, president of the Federal Office of Economics and Export Control (BAFA) told Rheinische Post.

The first on-the-ground assessment took place in India to review the sale of 30 high-precision rifles to a governmental buyer. "They were all in their indicated location," Obersteller confirmed.

In the current pilot phase of the scheme, the BAFA is focusing its examinations on small and light weapons. The controls are the consequence of new regulations for arms sales devised by Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel in his previous post as Economics Minister.

According to the legislation, Germany must monitor whether so-called Third States, which are neither members of the European Union, nor NATO, abide by rules which prevent the re-sale of German arms.

The checks are only carried out on the condition that recipient countries grant permission to do so.

Speaking in the Rheinische Post on Wednesday, Economics secretary of state Matthias Machnig emphasized that Germany was the first country in the EU to carry out such examinations. The regulation marked the strictest regime for the export of small arms implemented in German history, he argued.

The German Federal government approved the export of arms exports worth 6.85 billion euros in 2016, making Germany the fifth largest exporter of weapons in the world.

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