Spain: NGOs are up in arms

NGOs in Spain have accused the government of ignoring a national law that forbids selling weapons to countries with shady human rights records. Amnesty International, Fundaciò per la Pau, Greenpeace and Intermòn Oxfam announced last week that in 2009 Spain sold arms to several countries often in the spotlight for human rights violations, like Columbia, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and, notably, Thailand where violent protests recently made worldwide headlines.

According to a report published by the Spanish Ministry of Commerce, during the first half of 2009 Spain exported 411.1 million euros worth of “defence weapons”, 64.5% more than 2008’s figures for the same period. The problem, says Francisco Yermo of Intermòn Oxfam, is that “more clarity and transparency regarding these sales is needed. Its not clear why the government doesn’t explain what criteria it uses when authorizing sales or what information it bases is evaluation of the situation in the countries it sells weapons to”.

Law 53/2007 regulates the Spanish weapons trade and states that no sales can be made to countries in which the weapons are likely to be used to violate human rights, be transferred to third party countries or used in contravention to humanitarian law. It also states that the government must take UN and NGO human rights reports into account when deciding whether to export weapons to a country. Despite this, in 2009 large amounts of Spanish weapons ended up in places considered “worrying” by Spanish NGOs including: Morocco (29.5 million euros worth), Colombia (31 million euros), Saudi Arabia (5 million euros).

Both the UN and human rights NGOs had sent out reports warning that violence in Sri Lanka had resulted in serious war crimes being committed by both sides of the conflict. The Spanish government still approved the sale of 1.1 million euros worth of “bombs, torpedos and missiles”.

Amnesty International spokesperson Sabina Puig wonders how the Spanish government can possibly guarantee that none of these weapons will end up in the hands of human rights violators and Mabel Gonzales of Greenpeace says that the government has crossed “all the red lines imposed by the law”.

The law was passed two years ago which, say the NGOs, has given the government plenty of time to adjust to the stricter regulations.