Has the UK’s Labour Government delivered the ethical foreign policy it promised?
Gideon Burrows, author of New Internationalist’s No-Nonsense Guide to the Arms Trade,
reviews the evidence:-
UK Ethical Foreign Policy | 27-11-02
UK
Ethical Foreign Policy?
Has the UK’s
Labour Government delivered the ethical foreign policy it promised?
Gideon Burrows, author of New Internationalist’s No-Nonsense
Guide to the Arms Trade,
reviews the evidence:-
1. THE AXIS OF EVIL
May 2002: US President George Bush adds Cuba, Libya and Syria to his ‘axis of evil’ alongside Iraq, Iran and North Korea: these are the states that must be stopped, militarily if necessary, because they support terrorism.
October 2002: US and UK arms companies, along with UK royalty, attend an arms fair in Jordan in the Middle East. Buying arms at the fair are delegations from Iraq, Iran, Syria and Libya.
2. IRAQ
1980s and early 1990s: The US and UK supply arms to Iraq to support Saddam in his war against Iran. By 1994 American firms have supplied Saddam with germs that could be used to make biological weapons, including anthrax.
September 2002: “Saddam has used chemical weapons, not only against an enemy state, but against his own people”: UK Prime Minister Tony Blair justifies his determination to declare war on Iraq, by referring to the Saddam’s gassing of 5,000 Kurdish civilians in Halabja on 16th March 1998.
3. INDIA / PAKISTAN
February 2002: The UK Government grants 148 licences for the export of arms to India, and another 18 licenses for the export of arms to Pakistan.
July 2002: UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw visits India and Pakistan to urge the leaders of these nuclear powers to pull back from the brink of war.
October 2002: UK Prime Minister Tony Blair invites Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee for talks on peace in Kashmir and the war on terrorism. Blair spends nearly half of his meeting asking the Indian leader to buy £1bn worth of UK built fighter jets.
4. AFRICA
October 2001: “The state of Africa is a scar on the conscience of the world. But if the world as a community focused on it, we could heal it. And if we don't, it will become deeper and angrier.” UK Prime Minister Tony Blair shows how much he cares about the world’s poorest continent.
September 2002: UK arms firms flog weapons at an arms fair in South Africa, which the UK Defence Manufacturers Association bills as a “vital opportunity for the international defence and commercial aerospace fraternities to market their products and services in Africa”.
December 2001: The UK government refuses to withdraw a license for a £28m military air traffic control system for Tanzania, one of Africa’s most poverty stricken, debt ridden countries. Even the World Trade Organisation condemns the deal.
5.
AFGHANISTAN
1980s: The US and UK supply up to 350 Blowpipe and Stinger
missile launchers to Mujahidin rebels in Afghanistan. The same rebels seize
power in 1996, becoming known as the Taliban.
October 2001: The US, UK and much of the rest of the world declare war on Afghanistan, because the leadership refuses to give up Osama Bin Laden - the war is later justified because the Taliban were such a brutal regime.
6. LANDMINES
August 1998: The UK passes the Antipersonnel Landmines Act into law, banning the manufacture, promotion, sale or possession of antipersonnel landmines on UK soil.
September 1999: A Pakistani arms firm and a Romanian arms firm both attempt to sell antipersonnel landmines to undercover journalists at and following a UK arms fair - the Defence Systems Equipment International Exhibition (DSEi). No charges are brought.
May 2002: BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan is offered antipersonnel landmines by a UK company, PW Defence. No charges are brought.
Gideon Burrows for the NI website.
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