Swiss War Materiel and Arms Exports

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Piranhas and LAVs for Saudi Arabia

Goods category: War materiel

Mowag Piranha II 8×8, Swiss army, 17.06.2016.

CC BY-SA 4.0

Piranha armoured vehicles were documented during the Saudi troop intervention in Bahrain in March 2011. In May 2015, television footage showed Saudi wheeled armoured vehicles from the Mowag Piranha family near Najran on the border with Yemen. SECO said the vehicles shown had been manufactured outside Switzerland. Saudi Arabia’s fleet originated from earlier Swiss deliveries and more extensive foreign licensed production. Another case concerned Canadian export permits dated 8 April 2016 for Piranha-based LAV armoured vehicles under a Saudi deal agreed in 2014 by General Dynamics Land Systems Canada. Canadian parliamentarian Daniel Turp challenged them on grounds including the human rights situation and the war in Yemen. The Federal Court dismissed the claim on 24 January 2017; the Federal Court of Appeal upheld this on 6 July 2018. The courts left the ministerial licensing decision in place.

Effect of the proposed War Materiel Act revision

Under the new Article 22b, the Federal Council could depart from all the licensing criteria in Article 22a under vaguely defined ‘exceptional circumstances’. The public would not have to be informed. The Federal Council could add Saudi Arabia to Annex 2 by amending the War Materiel Ordinance. This would remove the exclusion criterion based on participation in an armed conflict and make approval the rule. The Federal Council could refuse a licence only in exceptional cases. Article 18 paragraph 1 would abolish non-re-export declarations in the vast majority of cases. Weapons for Saudi Arabia could thus easily be supplied through a subsidiary or intermediary in a third country. The United States could serve as a third country, having, according to SIPRI, supplied substantial quantities of war materiel to Saudi Arabia in recent years (24’295 million TIV).

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Time period

Bahrain in 2011; Najran in 2015; earlier deliveries and licensed manufacture; Canadian approvals in 2016, judgments in 2017–2018

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