January 2012
26 posts
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“In 2010, 56% of EU small arms exports authorizations to the MENA came from...”
– Here’s what I wrote on January 12th, 2012:
But if the tiny european country was the EU’s most prominent exporter of such arms in 2009, it looks like Germany took over for 2010.
In 2010, Belgium issued 48 SALW (Small Arms and Light Weapons) licenses to Middle Eastern and North African...
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More Battlefield Forensics, This Time from Syria. →
cjchivers:
Call it what you will: front-line forensics, battlefield paleontology. We seem to have started something, and like what it looks like. Hit the link above and nod in satisfaction, and with respect.
Modern conflict is all too often contemplated solely through the emotional, social and political forces that give wars their energy. We have entire cadres of journalists, scholars,...
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“We’ve had to buy all this ourselves with money raised by the refugees....”
– “Yassin”, the commander of one 25-strong FSA (Free Syrian Army) unit.
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“With over €282 million in small arms exports authorised in 2009, Belgium was the...”
– Diversion of European-Made Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW), in Rhetoric or Restraint?, An Vranckx (ed.), Gent Academia Press, 2010.
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Arms Exports: What the Walloon Government... →
Reading the 2010 report on arms exportations issued by the Walloon government, one might notice some interesting things.
In this report, the “ML1” category stands for the small arms and light weapons (SALW) and their parts. As Luc Mampaey, from the Group for Research and Information on Peace and Security (GRIP), puts it: “There are 99% chances, especially when it comes to big...
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How is the FN Herstal USA Lobbying Doing?
It’s amazing what you can find on the internet. I was quite interested in this investigation, made by the Belgian French-speaking daily Le Soir, on those Belgian companies endorsing US presidential candidates. Of course, I wanted to know if FN Herstal was part of that whole game. So I checked on the Center for Responsive Politics website. Here’s what I found.
FN Herstal has been...
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What alarm?
After publishing the previous piece on the ‘Lessons from MENA’ report, where Belgium plays quite a role, I wanted to go a bit further on some questions. So here are more details about certain things.
“Alarms would go off”
The commission also appeared appeased by the assurance given by FN Herstal that these new arms come marked in such way as to be traceable at all times....
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“Hopefully the Arab spring will turn out to be a wake-up call for European...”
– This quote comes from a report published in November 2011 called ‘Lessons from MENA. Appraising EU transfers of military and security equipment to the Middle East and North Africa. A contribution to the review of the EU Common Position.’
Edited by An Vranckx, Frank Slijper and Roy...
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“We supply pistols, over assault riffles, light and medium machine guns and...”
– “Mr. Michel”, head of logistics, FN Herstal. Quoted by “The Tripoli Post” during “LibDex” (Libyan Defense and Security Exhibition) that took place near Tripoli (Mitiga Airport) on November 8, 2010.
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Face à l'info, RTBF, 22 février 2011
Journaliste: Nico Cué, Bonsoir
Nico Cué: Bonsoir
Journaliste: Vous êtes le secrétaire général des metallo à la FGTB, vous êtes vous-même accroché à cette région où produit la FN Herstal. C’est un problème tabou depuis longtemps lorsqu’on évoque, dans les internationales socialistes, les mouvements ouvriers ou internationaux, la question de la paix. Vous y êtes historiquement très attaché et la question des armes devient très vite une question sensible : on parle en terme d’emploi et rarement en terme de finalité.
Nico Cué: Oui, mais je pense qu’on est dans un monde qui, malheureusement, est un monde injuste. Et donc c’est parce qu’on prend le problème par l’autre bout de la lorgnette. Et je pense que si aujourd’hui je suis un peu énervé, c’est l’émotion qu’on a essayé de faire ressentir, parce que dans la fameuse vidéo montrant l’arme de la FN on a considéré que c’était d’abord un mercenaire libyen et puis on se rend compte que c’est peut être des armes qui sont tombées aux mains de l’opposition et à mon avis *les travailleurs libyens ou l’ensemble de la population libyenne a besoin de ces armes aussi pour renverser le régime*.
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"The Gun" - C.J. Chivers - pourquoi la Kalashnikov...
Je prends un peu de temps pour recommander un livre que j’ai lu : “The Gun”, de Christopher J. Chivers.
Pour ceux qui ne connaissent pas le travail de Chivers, journaliste au New York Times, je conseillerais en introduction l’excellent article The School. Publié en 2007 dans Esquire (et élu depuis au panthéon des articles du célèbre magazine américain),...
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Louis-Pierre Dillais (ex-DGSE), executive in FN...
The Belgian Dutch-speaking newspaper De Morgen says, in its edition of January 4, 2012, that Louis-Pierre Dillais is the director of FN Herstal USA. Dillais, formerly working for the French secret services, played a major role in the attack of the Greenpeace’s ship “Rainbow Warrior” in 1985.
Robert Sauvage, FN Herstal’s spokesperson, refuses to comment, as usual. He...
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"L'Open Vld refédéralisera la vente d'armes si...
La sénatrice Nele Lijnen (Open Vld) réagissait dans le Morgen de ce lundi 2 janvier 2012 au fait que la Région Wallonne ne semble pas prête à s’engager dans la localisation des armes qu’elle a vendues au régime du colonel Kadhafi.
Madame Lijnen avait également réagit sur Twitter par la suite, mais elle semble depuis avoir effacé son tweet. Le voici:
Nele Lijnen aura sans doute jugé...
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Belgium sold weapons to Libya while knowing about...
In May 2008, the Belgian arms factory FN Herstal signed a deal with the Libyan government of Col. Muammar Qaddafi (if you want to have more background on that, you might want to click here (EN) or here (FR)). On the 11th of July of the same year, FN asked the Walloon Government for licenses in order to proceed with the deal. The Walloon Government, before eventually agreeing in June 2009,...
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Le 19 octobre 2011, Amnesty International publiait...
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“Belgium has a big responsibility here. We can’t just let Belgian weapons...”
– Nele Lijnen (Open VLD), a Flemish politician, asked a written question to both Didier Reynders (Foreign Affairs) and Pieter De Crem (Defense) over the fact that Belgian weapons are still in their thousands in Libya and that the Walloon Government doesn’t want to get involved in tracing and... 