The Arms Fixers

Arms brokers and transport agents locate arms as cheaply as possible. Then some send them by circuitous international routes to the most conflict-torn countries and regions of human rights abuse in the world. This study looks at what they do, and makes proposals for stopping it.

The brokers and transport agents studied here systematically use Europe as a staging post for deals in the rest of the world, while also developing satellite posts with partners in other countries. Many authorities in Europe are of course aware that some of their citizens and residents are involved as brokers and transport agents trading arms via third countries to illegal and controversial destinations, but the most powerful governments – those who could set an example – have failed to close the loopholes in their national laws. Lack of international trust and cooperation, political inertia, public ignorance of the gravity of the problem, failure to develop professional law enforcement, and fear of the powerful arms industry lobby – these are some of the reasons that allow this deadly situation to continue.

Most agents try to ensure that the activities they conduct are purely legal – but ‘legal’ often has little meaning, because few states have strict laws and regulations specifically designed to control the international activities of such agents. Home authorities tend to assume that their foreign arms deals are controlled from other jurisdictions. Some brokers and transport agents in this study are shown to have arranged the ‘legal’ supply of arms to perpetrators of international crimes against humanity and war crimes. They have been allowed to circumvent United Nations mandatory arms
embargoes and national arms control regulations, making a mockery of the rule of law.

Agents who broker and arrange the transport of arms outside their home countries, taking the profits through offshore accounts, can easily locate cheap supplies of arms in states that lack the capacity to control arms exports and surplus stocks properly, or whose governance is so weak that there is no manifest political will to exercise proper control. By using increasingly global networks, these ‘fixers’ can find customers – some in governments, some not – who will buy or barter small arms, light weapons and associated military equipment so as to engage in organized crime, suppress
political opponents and fight civil wars, regardless of the high proportion of civilian casualties.¹ To cover up their trail – for legal or purely ethical reasons, but also to
secure their future business prospects from unscrupulous customers – arms fixers
establish intricate international networks of sub-contractors, front companies and
devious transport routes. Some also use the same techniques for trafficking in other controlled or illegal goods.

A growing body of research and published literature is emerging to address the worldwide problem of small arms and light weapons proliferation. Often, however, the analysis and policy solutions do not fully address the real world of international small-arms dealers and the methods used to carry out arms transfers on the fringes of the law. The only available data on international arms transfers concern those items sent or authorized from country A to country B. This information may be adequate for tracking large conventional arms, but not for identifying who is behind much of the modern trade in small arms. Moreover, most governments are insufficiently transparent about exports of small arms, light weapons and paramilitary equipment, making it very difficult for independent researchers to uncover and reliably document the hidden deals and complex routes used by arms fixers.

This study seeks to cast light on some recent cases of arms brokering and trafficking via third countries to regions of violent conflict and serious human rights abuse. We want to describe the activities of arms brokers and trafficking or transport agents (also known as shipping agents or brokers) and their associated sub-contractors, in order to examine what measures governments can take to prevent such activities from contributing to serious violations of international law. We also propose an agenda for change which includes a package of interdependent recommendations for priority action by governments.

Research on this topic is difficult because secrecy is de riguer in the arms brokering and supplying business, especially where illegitimate customers and controversial destinations are involved. Creating the documentation and laundering the money is a skill that brokers deploy for this purpose. Experienced transporters and shipping agents, some willing to risk their lives and freedom for a substantial undercover payment, are also central to the arms-fixing business; they try not to leave accurate records, especially not about their paymasters. The cases in this study should be read with that in mind.

Into the 21st Century

During the Cold War, arms brokers and shippers developed outside the state system, but with close ties to competing national security agencies. They were used to make covert arms transfers to politically favoured recipients of the major powers. But with the growth of free markets in international finance and products, and changing technologies, a new breed of arms fixers has broken away from informal reigns of the old patrimonial state security systems. They are beyond control.

Arms brokering and trafficking have expanded virtually unchecked throughout and beyond the Cold War era. This expansion seems set to continue into the next century unless governments can establish significantly better laws and regulations, as well as administrative and law enforcement systems to address the problem. Most European countries now have hundreds if not thousands of private brokering agents and companies that are registered or allowed to trade internationally in military and security equipment. They have used the deregulated European common market to seek opportunities to trade arms as part of the free transfer of goods within the European Union, and have taken advantage of other international agreements, such as the NATO treaty, to circumvent stricter export and import controls.

A new wave of arms brokering and shipping agents has emerged in the 1990s, located in hitherto less-developed countries. Learning the tricks of the trade from their counterparts in the better-off countries of Western Europe and North America, such brokers and shippers have the comparative advantage of being closer to the zones of violent conflict and hence to the demand side of the market for arms. Many in the new wave of brokers and trafficking agents are retired or even serving military and security officers who have started up their own companies, or who go into partnership with others with a business background. They might also be former employees of arms companies.² Sometimes these dealers and operators have emerged from the procurement wing of armed opposition groups like the Tamil Tigers. Alongside them are the growing band of private military companies that have a more specific arms brokering and shipping role. One such company, Executive Outcomes, has been based in South Africa and registered in the UK, but it was part of a wide international network of
corporate interests providing military services for mining interests.³

The international community has agreed to exercise restraint and caution in considering arms transfers that may contribute to excessive and destabilizing accumulations of small arms and light weapons and ammunition.⁴ Powerful Western governments, in particular, have led the calls for joint action to this end.⁵ However, such calls for restraint and caution are meaningless unless backed up by strict laws and regulations, and effective law enforcement – because, in the real world, the senders and recipients of arms in countries chosen for business by unscrupulous brokers can be corrupt
officials, or regimes that grossly violate human rights, or even armed opposition or criminal groups.

Some Definitions

trafficking, contracting transport facilities, carriers and their crew to deliver arms cargoes, ensuring that storage, ports and routes are available to complete each deal, but not necessarily carrying out the actual transportation. Transport agents making such arrangements include ‘shipping agents and brokers’, ‘freight forwarders’ and ‘charterers’.⁶

In the following we will focus on the second and third types of dealers, which are closely interdependent.⁷

For the purposes of this study, ‘arms’ may include all types of military, security and police equipment and services, although many governments fail to include all such items. The focus here is on small arms, light weapons and associated explosives and equipment; the generic term ‘small arms’ will be employed as shorthand to cover this wide range of military and paramilitary equipment that is used in current civil wars, internal repression and violent crime.⁸ ‘Arms transfers’ refers to all arms transferred outside the control of the state from which they are sent. All dollars are US dollars.

If governments wish to argue that such arms dealers have legitimate activities, they must strictly regulate all three types of arms dealing. Despite the millions of victims in the world who have suffered from the proliferation of small arms, most governments have failed lamentably in their duty to provide such regulation.

¹    International Committee of the Red Cross, Arms Availability and the Situation of Civilians in Armed Conflict (Geneva, June 1999).
²    Ferial Haffajee, ‘New Black Guns Blast into Arms World’, Daily Mail and Guardian (South
Africa), 1 August 1997.
³    Journey Pictures, ‘The War Business’, Dispatches, Channel 4 Television, UK, April 1998.
⁴    United Nations General Assembly, resolution 52/38 J, 9 December 1997, endorsing the recommendations of a report entitled ‘Small Arms’ prepared by a Panel of Governmental Experts.
⁵    See, for example, the statement by 21 like-minded states under the auspices of Canada and
Norway,‘An International Agenda on Small Arms and Light Weapons: Elements of a Common Understanding’, Norway Information, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Oslo, July 1998; and the Brussels Call for Action, Conference on Sustainable Disarmament for Sustainable Development, attended by over 100 government representatives and 300 others, hosted by the Belgian Minister for Development Cooperation, October 1988.
⁶    ‘Shipping’ can mean trafficking by sea, air or road. The vessels used are often leased or chartered. Some shipping agents call themselves shipping brokers. The generic term ‘transport agents’ is used here unless a more specific description is required. See Report by a Consultative Group of Experts on the feasibility of undertaking a study for restricting the manufacture and trade of small arms to manufacturers and dealers authorized by States, contained in Note by the Secretary-General, United Nations, A/54/160, 6 July 1999.
⁷    In its White Paper of July 1998 on Strategic Export Controls, the UK government defines broker-
ing as ‘Acting, as an agent in putting a deal together between supplier and customer, or making the practical arrangements for the supply of the goods.’
⁸    UN-agreed definitions: (a) small arms: include revolvers and self loading pistols, rifles and carbines, sub-machine guns, assault rifles and light machine guns below 20 mm in calibre; (b) light weapons: include heavy machine guns over 20 mm in calibre, portable anti-aircraft guns, portable anti-tank guns and recoilless rifles, portable launchers of anti-tank missile and rocket systems, portable launchers of anti-aircraft missile systems and mortars of less than 100 mm; (c) ammunition and explosive devices used for the above (Paragraph 26 of the Report of the UN Panel of Government Experts on Small Arms, UN Secretary General to the General Assembly, A/52/298, 27 August 1997). By ‘associated military and paramilitary equipment’, we mean items commonly used to facilitate the movement, communications and protection of warring parties, internal security forces and criminals who primarily use small arms and light weapons.