APPENDIX 26
Memorandum submitted by Campaign Against
Arms Trade
1. The Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT)
is opposed to all military exports, but recognises that, despite
its negative effects on human rights, security and the economy,
the arms trade will not end overnight. As an interim measure,
therefore, CAAT is seeking an export licensing policy with an
emphasis on restraint, especially on exports to governments which
violate human rights or to countries in areas of conflict. This
leads CAAT to focus its campaigning on sales to particular countries,
one of them being China.
2. Following the Tiananmen Square massacre
in June 1989, the UK imposed an embargo on the sale to China of
"weapons and equipment that could be used for internal repression".
Sir Geoffrey Howe, then Foreign Secretary, told the House of Commons
on 6 June 1989 that "all arms sales to China have been banned".
On 26 June a European Union embargo was adopted. However, its
scope could not be agreed, and it was left to the individual interpretation
of Member States.
3. The late Foreign Office Minister Derek
Fatchett reiterated the UK's position to the House of Commons
on 3 June 1998:
"The EU introduced a ban on arms sales to
China on 26 June 1989, but the scope of that ban has, in the absence
of a common interpretation, been left for national interpretation.
The UK interprets this ban to include:
lethal weapons such as machine guns, large calibre
weapons, bombs, torpedoes, rockets, and missiles; specially designed
components of the above, and ammunition;
military aircraft and helicopters, vessels of
war, armoured fighting vehicles and other such weapons platforms;
any equipment which is liable to lead to internal
repression." (Hansard, 3 June 1998)
4. China's human rights record continues
to be poor. Political opponents of the regime are imprisoned,
there are cases of torture and the death penalty is used extensively.
Tibet remains under Chinese control, and nationalists and Buddhists
there are persecuted.
REPRESSIVE TECHNOLOGY
5. Selling repressive technology equipment
to China was prohibited by the embargo. This did not stop a Glaswegian
businessman, Roger Stott of ICL Technical Plastics, claiming on
Channel 4's Dispatches programme in January 1995 that he
sold electro-shock weapons to the Chinese authorities via Hong
Kong a year after the Tiananmen Square massacre. He said he did
this with the UK government's blessing during a trip sponsored
by the Department of Trade and Industry. He also claimed that
the Chinese authorities wanted to copy his baton. ("A Glimpse
of Hell", Amnesty International 1996; AI press release, 21
August 1997).
6. Following the programme, Mr Stott pleaded
guilty in August 1997 to the unlicensed possession of an electro-shock
baton and was fined £5,000. His story regarding his Chinese
links was not examined in Court, but there are workshops in China
which produce electro-shock weapons in great quantities.
7. The UK government has licensed the export
of para-military and crowd control equipment to the Hong Kong
Special Administrative Region when it would not do so to similar
forces in mainland China. Foreign Office Minister Peter Hain MP
said that the UK government is "pretty confident" that
the equipment is not crossing over to the mainland. The situation
is regularly checked by visiting officials from the Foreign and
Commonwealth Office, the Department of Trade and Industry, the
Ministry of Defence and Customs and Excise. (Quadripartite Committee
on Strategic Export Controls, 4 May 2000).
8. China has been represented at private
arms exhibitions such as the Covert and Operational Procurement
Exhibition in Surrey in November 1994. A wide range of internal
security equipment was on display. ("A Glimpse of Hell",
Amnesty International 1996).
UK MILITARY LINKS
WITH CHINA
9. The 1989 embargo was partly symbolic,
a means of expressing condemnation of China's massacre of peaceful
protestors in Tiananmen Square. The embargo, however, did not
cover most of the equipment that the UK was, and is, actually
exporting to China. Within months of the imposition of the embargo,
GEC-Marconi was allowed to go ahead with a £30 million sale
of "head-up displays" and radar equipment for Chinese
fighters on the grounds that these were "avionics, not arms".
(Jane's Defence Weekly, 23 September 1989). This significantly
weakened the message of disapproval.
10. Military links have grown over the years
and include official visits, invitations to exhibitions and military
training, as well as military sales by UK companies. These links
lessen the impact of the embargo as the Chinese authorities can
dismiss it as a sop to western public opinion, worded and implemented
by successive UK governments to allow their companies to continue
to provide China with the electronics needed to equip its indigenous
and Russian-supplied weaponry.
11. In May 1996 the then Deputy Prime Minister
Michael Heseltine headed a trade delegation to China which included
representatives of British Aerospace and GKN Westland. (Sunday
Business, 19 May 1996) Sir Peter Inge, the Chief of British
Defence staff, visited China in November 1996, and in March 1997
China's Chief of the General Staff, General Fu Quanyou, returned
Inge's visit. General Fu had meetings with Michael Heseltine,
and Michael Portillo, then Secretary of State for Defence, and
his itinerary included visits to RAF Wittering to see the latest
Harrier Jump Jets, and the Royal School of Artillery at Larkhill,
Wiltshire for the UK's latest quick firing gun, the AS-90. (Independent,
25 March 1997).
12. General Chi Haotian, who commanded the
troops in the Tiananmen Square massacre and is now Defence Minister,
visited the UK in January 2000 and met with the Deputy Prime Minister,
John Prescott, and Geoffrey Hoon, the Secretary of State for Defence.
(Daily Telegraph, 14 January 2000).
13. China has been invited to UK government
sponsored arms exhibitions, such as Defence Systems and Equipment
International held in September 1999. Conversely, the UK government
encouraged UK companies to visit the International Defence Electronics
Exhibition in Beijing in 1998. (Hansard, 13 November 1997).
14. Training under the United Kingdom Military
Training Assistance Scheme has been provided to China. (Hansard,
26 April 1999).
15. The part of BAE Systems that was formerly
GEC-Marconi has long history of selling to China, see paragraph
9 above. However, recent reports suggest that European governments
are hesitant to approve the supply of key avionics systems for
the Chengu FC1/Super 7 fighter, being developed by China and Pakistan.
A package based around BAE Systems' Blue Hawk radar is one that
has been affected. It seems, though, that it is concerns about
Pakistan, following the military coup in October 1999, that have
prompted disquiet rather than the embargo on China. (Flight
International, 18 January 2000).
16. In 1998 the old British Aerospace, now
the other part of BAE Systems, established a joint venture called
EuroMandarin with First Mandarin, a Hong Kong trading and project
management company. Although it planned to start with civil aerostructures,
it was acknowledged that the relationship could help support future
military aerospace deals. (Flight International, 1 July
1998).
17. Other UK companies which have supplied
military equipment to China during the 1990's include Racal-Thorn
which sold maritime surveillance and airborne early-warning applications
in 1996 for £40 million. These were to be fitted either to
medium-range transport or maritime-patrol and surveillance flying
boats. (Flight International, 14 August 1996) Siemens-Plessey
sold a £18 million radar system to China in 1993, and in
the same year modified its Ptarmigan digital truck communications
network in a deal worth £22 million. (Engineer, 19
August 1993).
THE EUROPEAN
UNION
18. The effectiveness of the message of
the embargo has also been circumscribed as it has been left to
each Member State to interpret as it feels fit. Indeed, according
to Foreign Office Minister Peter Hain MP, the UK does not know
what the other Member States have been selling to China. (Quadripartite
Committee on Strategic Export Controls, 4 May 2000).
SECURITY CONCERNS
19. The embargo was not instituted in response
to, and does not continue as a result of, concerns about either
China's belligerent attitude to Taiwan, considered to be a "rebel
province" that must be brought back into the fold, or to
its disputed claims to the Spratley Islands. Nor was the embargo
imposed due to the security implications of exporting equipment
helpful of the development of long-range missile technology. As
well as enhancing its own capability, reports, usually emanating
from the United States, have at various times alleged that China
is helping Pakistan, Libya and Iran enhance theirs. (Times,
17 June 1998; Financial Times, 26 February 1999).
20. China has countered that the USA would
itself be violating the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR)
if it assists in the building of a Theatre Missile Defence shield
for Taiwan, Japan and South Korea. The MTCR was set up in 1987
to curb the transfer of technology that could proliferate the
development of ballistic missile systems. China is not a member
of the MTCR, but has agreed to abide by its principles. (Financial
Times, 26 February 1999 and 6 March 1999).
21. Military co-operation between China
and the USA grew during the 1980's, but was suspended after the
Tiananmen Square massacre. During the 1990's Russia was the most
active purveyor of military hardware to China, but more recently
Israel has been a major supplier. The US has raised concerns that
Israel might have supplied China with arms sold to Israel on condition
they were not passed to third countries. (Financial Times, 19
February 1999 and 25 November 1999).
22. In May 1999 the US Congressional Cox
report detailed Chinese spying and theft of US nuclear secrets.
The report, dismissed by China, said that US companies were generally
unprepared for the reality of doing business in a country where
"the appetite for information and technology appears insatiable",
(Independent, 26 May 1999).
23. The UK's Annual Reports on Strategic
Export Controls do not, currently, give enough detail about the
individual licences to allow informed comment as to whether or
not exports from the UK would assist China in the development
of missile technology or weapons of mass destruction.
24. China did not supply information to
the United Nations Register of Conventional Arms in 1998, the
latest at the time of writing, in protest at the inclusion of
data pertaining to Taiwan.
RECOMMENDATIONS
25. The 1989 embargo should be reconfirmed
as China fails to meet several of the criteria of European Union
Code of Conduct on Arms Exports, including:
Criterion Two—the respect of human rights;
Criterion Four—preservation of regional
peace, security and stability.
26. The UK government should extend its
interpretation of the embargo to cover all goods needing a licence
under Part III of Schedule 1 to the Export of Goods (Control)
Order 1994.
27. The UK government should investigate
whether the other European Union Member States could agree a common
interpretation of the embargo to cover all military goods. If
this is not possible, information about exports should be shared
between the Governments of Member States.
28. Delegations from China should not be
invited to UK arms exhibitions, or to visit UK military companies
or Ministry of Defence establishments.
29. The UK government should take steps
to raise awareness across government departments of the methods
used to circumvent embargoes so that, for instance, inappropriate
individuals and companies are not invited to be part of trade
delegations as appears to have happened in the case of Mr Stott.
30. The UK government should extend to other
parts of China, and elsewhere, the commendably high level of end
use monitoring that takes place in respect of exports to Hong
Kong.
31. The UK and other western countries should
be scrupulous about their adherence to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty, the MTCR and other international arms control measures
to encourage other countries, such as China, to do likewise.
32. The UK government's Annual Reports on
Strategic Export Controls, the content of which is under review,
should give details of the type of equipment licensed, the manufacturer,
and the number of items. Full information is a prerequisite for
informed debate, and its release should take precedence over commercial
confidentiality or the military security interests of overseas
governments.
33. The UK government should make details
of military equipment export licences available for public inspection
10 working days in advance of the licence application being considered,
in order to allow adequate time for comment and, if necessary,
debate. Politicians and the public have the right to have their
representations taken into account when applications are considered.
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