US biggest developing nations weapons supplier

The US is the largest supplier of weapons to developing nations, delivering more than $9.6bn (€7.86bn) in arms to countries including those in the Near East and Asia in 2004, and boosting worldwide sales to those countries to the highest amount since 2000, a congressional study says.

The total worldwide value of all agreements to sell arms last year was close to $37bn (€30.3bn) and nearly 59% of the agreements were with developing nations, according to the Congressional Research Service report.

The weapons being sold range from ammunition to tanks, combat aircraft, missiles and submarines.

As economic pressures led to a worldwide decline in weapons orders – from about $42bn (€34.3bn) in 2000 to $37bn (€30.3bn) last year – competition is forcing the US and European countries to forge agreements to develop weapons jointly.

China, Egypt and India were the heaviest buyers of the weapons.

Last year, for example, the US completed agreements to sell helicopters and other weapons to Egypt, radar systems to Taiwan, helicopters to Brazil and Israel and other weapons systems to Oman and Pakistan.

Developing countries are the weapons’ primary buyers. And the US has been the most active seller for the past eight years, resulting mainly from agreements made in the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf war.

The US was responsible for more than 42% of the deliveries to developing nations in 2004.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack explained the transfers as “a very serious national security and a foreign policy matter” carried out under “a very rigorous set of rules and regulations and laws.”

“And just as we exercise restraint in our own transfers, we encourage restraint by other countries,” including the European Union, which McCormack said should reconsider its decision to resume arms shipments to China.

Russia, which ranks second, sells mostly to China and India, as well as a number of smaller, poorer countries.

The CRS study, which is done each year, was written by national defence specialist Richard Grimmett. He said in the study that developed nations have tried in recent years to emphasise joint projects rather than simply buying the weapons from each other, so they can preserve their own industrial bases.

A US State Department report says evidence indicates that Russia, Iran, North Korea and Syria continue to maintain biological weapons programs.

The report said China maintains “some elements” of an offensive biological weapons program. The study said US government experts were divided on whether Cuba is trying to develop a capability of using the weapons.

All six countries had been linked previously in varying degrees to BW programs.

The study, mandated by Congress and released yesterday, assesses compliance by foreign countries with arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament agreements. It covers developments over a two-year period ending in December 2004.

The study does not examine nuclear programs in Pakistan, India and Israel because none is a member of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and have not undertaken obligations to comply with the treaty’s terms.