Swiss War Materiel and Arms Exports

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Swiss weapons transferred by Ghana without consent

Goods category: War materiel

SIG 550 at the military museum in Morges, 17.07.2010.

CC BY-SA 2.0 FR

On 4 August 2016, Spanish authorities seized 737 Swiss assault rifles and 72 grenade launchers in Algeciras on their way from Ghana to the United States. The weapons had been exported via Hungary in 2011 and arrived in Ghana in 2014. The transfer took place without Swiss consent. Switzerland temporarily suspended exports to Ghana and tightened the requirements for non-re-export declarations in 2017. B&T had obtained the assault rifles from SAN Swiss Arms and delivered them to a dealer in Hungary together with grenade launchers of its own manufacture. Ghana’s National Security Council had been named as the end recipient. All 737 assault rifles and 72 grenade launchers were still present during a Swiss end-use inspection in Ghana in 2015.

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. For the United States, as a current Annex 2 state, Article 22a paragraph 2bis 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. The Federal Council could add Ghana 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 Ghana could thus easily be supplied through a subsidiary or intermediary in a third country. Spain could serve as a third country, having, according to SIPRI, supplied substantial quantities of war materiel to Ghana in recent years (38 million TIV).

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Time period

2011–2017

Sources