The warmongers’ paradise

Despite all the declarations made by the international community against the weapons trade, rifles, Kalashnikovs, and landmines are spread throughout the world’s South, especially in Africa. Bucharest’s daily paper, Evenimentul Zilei, recently reported on the military co-operation contract signed between the Rumanian and the Rwandan government.

According to the above paper, Rumania, in April 1997, provided the government of Kigali (Rwanda) with no less than 76 tonnes of machine guns and automatic pistols. In February of the same year Rumania had sold 40 tonnes of Kalashnikovs to Rwanda, when there were conflicts taking place throughout the Democratic Republic of the Congo, formerly Zaire. The private Rumanian company, Acvila Air, took care of the transportation, renting an Antonov 124 in the Ukraine.

With respect to another scourge on the world’s most benighted populations, an estimated 100 million landmines are spread throughout some 62 developing countries in the world, as reported in the October 1997 edition of the Messenger of Saint Anthony. Within Angola, an estimated 10 to 15 million landmines have been planted - approximately one for every Angolan. In Mozambique, experts have predicted that 10 years and US$ 300 million will be required to remove most of its mines. Annual landmine casualties total more than 10,000 deaths plus 8000 lifelong mutilations, typically affecting women and children. Many more die from hunger as previously fertile land has become too dangerous to cultivate.

A dirty business

Arms kill indiscriminately in Africa. Many innocent people have lost their lives in recent years in countries such as Burundi, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan... After all, the money spent on this business hinders the economic and social development of many countries. In fact, the production, purchase and storage of weapons diverts money, investment and skilled expertise away from social priorities such as housing, education, health and sustainable job creation, and there is evidence to show that there are better and more efficient ways to create jobs. There is, therefore, an economic as well as a moral imperative to oppose unregulated and unaccountable arms trading.

According to UNICEF, the cost of one half day of world arms spending would pay for the full immunisation of all children world-wide against the most common infectious diseases. The cost of three weeks of world arms spending would pay for primary health care for every child in the poor countries of the world, including safe water and full immunisation.

Without a shadow of doubt something has to be done to stop the death and mutilation of fellow human beings.

The weapon trade is certainly a serious business, which often goes beyond the control of the single states, and is frequently carried out illegally. According to the Stockholm Sipri centre, the most expert centre on peace and security, the annual size of the world weapon market has gone from 45-46 billion dollars in the mid eighties, to 22-23 in this second phase of the nineties. According to International experts though, these figures must not encourage too much optimism. One must consider that the Sipri figures only deal with big army equipment, like aircraft, tanks, artillery, guide and radar systems, missiles and ships. On one hand it is true to say that ten or twenty years ago this equipment made up the majority of the trade, but the situation has changed.

Lies and statistics

Today’s weapon trade is based most of all on light weapons, and on modernising obsolete arsenals. Most of the conflicts taking place in the South of the world, and especially in Africa, are carried out almost entirely with smaller weapons, including mines. This causes a larger number of victims. From 1980 to 1995, ten African states, with a total population of 155 million inhabitants, were ravaged by internal wars. Between 3.8 and 6.9 million people, a total of between 2.5% and 4.5% of these country’s populations, have died, almost all of them because of small weapons,. According to experts, the estimates regarding the small weapon market are scarce and often inexact, and their exportation for war purposes is frequently covered up by apparent civil weapon sales.

Official statistics regarding this sort of commerce, value it as ranging from 7 to 10 billion dollars. What is even more disturbing is that international initiatives, to try and limit the spread of conventional weapons, are still few and far between. The UN has 2 instruments at it’s disposal: the imposition of an embargo on the expedition of weapons to certain countries, and the international transfer register. The first is frequently violated with the blessing of international authorities; and the second works based on spontaneous and uncontrolled declarations. Indeed the road to disarmament, on an international level, is still extremely distant.

Abominable crimes against humanity

Pope John Paul II in his Post Synod Apostolic Exhortation, The Church in Africa, writes: Those who foment wars in Africa by the arms trade are accomplices in abominable crimes against humanity. I make my own the Synod’s recommendation on this subject. Having said that the sale of arms is a scandal since it sows the seed of death, the Synod appealed to all countries that sell arms to Africa to stop doing so, and it asked African governments to move away from huge military expenditures and put the emphasis on the education, health and well being of their people.

Yet, what can an African do to make armed conflicts, land mines, hatchets and the terrorists’ hand made bombs become things of the past?

A large-scale action is necessary in order to break up and control the arms traffickers in their race for profit and the thirst for power of those who buy their goods.

Two-faced hypocrites!

In the present situation, more than a mere ethical debate, a Code of Conduct should be introduced, within the context of international law. Western countries repeatedly endorse UN appeals for reduced military spending in Africa, rightly pointing to its corrosive effect on development. And the U.N. Security Council issues heaps and heaps of appeals for peace in Africa. Yet, its five permanent members account for over four-fifths of the weapons exported to developing countries. This is a shame! Who is still so blind not to see the pressing need to stop destroying human lives? We have to acknowledge that, in this regard, many African governments have been derelict in their duty towards their own citizens. Both purchasers and suppliers must bear the main responsibility for supporting the arms trade. This is why a Code of Conduct could be a significant attempt to prevent the real causes of conflicts and draw public attention to the huge waste caused by military spending in African countries.

It is not enough to set up an international tribunal, like for example in the case of the Rwandan genocide, when nothing has been done to foresee and prevent the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocent people. It is a high time for everybody (politicians, citizens, youth...), in Africa and in Western countries to take some responsibility for stopping the arms trade. Greater public accountability would be a step in the right direction. Hence, it could be an opportunity for the industrial world to scale down its military production by diverting it into socially useful activity.

Algeria

Civil war between Islamic fundamentalists and government forces has raged since 1991, leaving up to 100,000 dead (see Messenger, March 1998).

Egypt

Islamic fundamentalists have been targeting tourists and foreign workers, more than 100 of whom have been killed since 1992.

Niger

Guerrilla warfare has recently broken out in the north, shattering the fragile cease-fire which had held since 1995.

Somalia

A cease-fire was signed between the warring factions in the civil war on 23 December, 1997, after seven years of civil war and the unsuccessful intervention of the United Nations Peacekeeping Force.

Sudan

Christian factions and separatists have been fighting against the brutal regime of the north since 1983. The war has caused over 1.5 million casualties.

Kenya

Daniel Arap Moi’s farcical re-election has provoked outcry from many groups protesting that the elections could in no way be considered ‘free and fair. With the support of the army Arap Moi has managed to bully most of his critics into silence or buy them off (Archbishop Ndingi, once famous for his stand on human rights, received a Mercedes Benz in November, 1997, two months before the elections, and has been silent ever since.)

Uganda

The government has its hands full with Islamic militants and forces from the Ugandan National Liberation Army in the north and Christian mystics in the south. The guerrillas raid villages and torture and kill those who refuse to enlist with them.

Rwanda and Burundi

Hutu guerrillas with bases in the democratic Republic of the Congo have been conducting sporadic raids in the two countries, attacking refugee camps and military government targets. Civil war in the two countries provoked more than 1.5 million deaths, though estimates are very vague, and at least 500,000 people are still located in refugee camps.

Senegal

Several cease-fires have been first signed and then broken. Armed conflict has been on the increase since October, provoking over 200 victims so far.

Sierra Leone

On 25 May, 1997, just 14 months after the first civilian government took office, military forces took power in a coup d’état. Nigerian forces have been sent to convince the military government to relinquish power in favour of the elected government. Funny enough, the military government in Nigeria also seized power in a coup d’état.

Congo Brazzaville

The ex-dictator, the Marxist Denis Sassou Nguessou, was sworn in as president of the People’s Republic of Congo on 25 October, 1997. The civil war in which he seized power from the democratically-elected president, Pascale Lissouba, provoked up to 10,000 victims. Lissouba is now in exile.

Democratic Republic of Congo

In May 1997, Laurent Kabila seized power from the exiled dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, who died later that year. International observers accuse Kabila of slaughter and of human rights violations before, during and since his conquest of power.