Examination of Witnesses (Questions 243-259)
DR KIM
HOWELLS MP, MR
TREVOR MOORE
AND MR
GRAHAM GLOVER
25 APRIL 2006
Chairman: At the outset there are three
members of the Committee who need to just declare their relevant
interests for the record. John, do you want to go first?
John Barrett: Yes, I have nothing to
declare.
Chairman: Excellent. Richard?
Richard Younger-Ross: I have nothing
to declare.
Chairman: Excellent. Quentin.
Mr Davies: My interests are set out in
the Register, but none of them relate to the work of this Committee.
Q243 Chairman: Excellent. Minister,
you are very welcome this afternoon. Again for the record, could
I invite you to introduce your colleagues and then we will start?
Dr Howells: On my left, your right,
is Trevor Moore; on my right, your left, is Graham Glover. I am
Kim Howells.
Q244 Chairman: You are very welcome,
Dr Howells, it is a pleasure to see you and your colleagues. You
will be aware that the Committee have received evidence from Mark
Thomas to show how easy it is for a group of school students to
set themselves up in the arms business, to become arms brokers
and to broker instruments of torture. Three items they were able
to show the Committee were items that are not on the current list
of instruments of torture, namely thumb cuffs, wall cuffs and
sting sticks. Is the Government prepared to ban those three items
immediately to bring them within the purview of the Government's
existing policy?
Dr Howells: I did not know what
they were when I read this, Mr Berry, I had to ask what thumb
cuffs were and sting sticks; I assumed sting sticks were some
sort of electrical equipment but turned out to be just a stick
with prongs on it.
Q245 Chairman: Yes.
Dr Howells: We certainly want
to work with other Member States and with the Commission to introduce
additional equipment for control such as these sting sticks where
necessary. We have led the world in this field in trying to identify
equipment that is used for torture and we will continue to do
so.
Q246 Chairman: Given the items that
the Government has already banned because they are instruments
of torture, is there any reason why thumb cuffs, wall cuffs and
sting sticks cannot be immediately added to the list?
Dr Howells: I do not think so,
unless my colleagues have any further information. As I understand
it, the exports of sting sticks are not on the list of items to
be controlled under the EU Torture Regulation; coverage of the
list is a matter for negotiation at EU level, and we will work
at that level, certainly, to introduce additional equipment for
control such as sting sticks.
Q247 Chairman: I thought the UK had
a derogation to extend the list of banned items at any time.
Mr Glover: Looking ahead to the
regulation, thumb cuffs will be on the regulation when it comes
into force on 30 July, when the EU regulation comes into force,
and those will be covered by the EU Torture Regulation. On wall
cuffs, we think we do already control wall cuffs as we do other
larger handcuffs; we would say that wall cuffs of a particular
dimension are actually already covered by our legislation. They
would be controlled not banned, but they would be controlled.
Q248 Chairman: And sting sticks?
Mr Glover: Sting sticks we would
need to take up with the Commission when the regulation comes
into force.
Q249 Chairman: I do not understand
why we should wait, I thought the UK had a derogation to extend
the list of banned items at any time; I thought that was the understanding
of discussions with Europe.
Mr Glover: We have a derogation
to maintain the standard that we have at present, yes, that is
the case, but to add new items to the list, I would have to go
back and look. Certainly, all the items that are currently on
our banned list we have a derogation to maintain and that level
of control at the moment.
Q250 Chairman: You say you are prevented
from adding new items to the list; something as vicious as a sting
stick, you are saying that the Government does not have the authority
to do what it did in 1997 to add this to a list of items that
would be banned for the purposes of manufacture or export.
Mr Glover: I am not aware of the
precise legal definitions of where we have to go, but it does
become a Community competence matter with the arrival of the EU
torture regulation. These items are not on the military list,
they are traded items and would have to be covered within the
Torture Regulation when it comes into force like any other trade
regulation, it is a Commission and EU competence matter.
Q251 Mr Keetch: Can I follow up on
that. What you are saying is that the British Government cannot
stop the export of these items if they believe they are potentially
being used for torture, that is only something that the EU can
do.
Mr Glover: It would be something
that the Commission would have to regulate on is my understanding,
I could go back and check for the Committee.
Dr Howells: We will certainly
check on that.
Q252 Chairman: I would be grateful,
because certainly it was my understanding that part of the discussions
with the other Member States of the European Union was that the
UK would have a derogation to extend the list of banned items
at any time. I appreciate that until EU provisions come in you
cannot have a derogation from them, but I do not understand what
legally prevents you banning instruments of torture, given that
they are so easily obtained by anybody who chooses to set themselves
up as an arms broker, whether they are school students or anyone
else. If, Minister, you could get back to us on that, we would
be grateful.
Dr Howells: I certainly will.
Chairman: Thank you. Sir John.
Q253 Sir John Stanley: Minister,
can we turn to trafficking, brokering and the issue of extraterritoriality?
We have taken extensive evidence on this point and, having heard
the evidence from NGOs and experts, the arms trade and arms manufacturers
and their supporters, it appears that the Government is now in
a minority of one in maintaining the position that extraterritoriality
should be limited simply to items of torture and missiles with
a range in excess of 300 kilometres. Can we press you, Minister,
to adopt the view which is now being universally taken, not only
in this Committee but by those outside, that at least the extraterritoriality
provision should be extended to MANPADs, rocket-propelled grenades
and light automatic weapons?
Dr Howells: I certainly take that
point, Sir John. I am not entirely sure about those particular
items; have they been identified by this Committee as the most
pressing need?
Q254 Sir John Stanley: By this Committee
and, indeed, by everybody who studies and understands this business
outside the Committee as the most likely weapons in which this
particular form of abuse could take place, in other words the
UK resident who, knowing it would be a criminal offence to export
these to a certain country from within this country, goes overseas
to another country and makes their money that way. We have taken
the view in this Committee that that is a wholly unacceptable
statutory position to continue and we urge you very, very strongly
to adopt the same position taken by this Committee and indeed
universally outside.
Dr Howells: I shall certainly
talk to my colleagues in detail about that.
Q255 Sir John Stanley: It is disappointing,
if I might say so, Minister; you are coming in front of this Committee
in place of the Cabinet Minister with the lead responsibility
in this particular area, and we were hoping to get expressions
of Government policy from you and not just undertakings to take
it back.
Dr Howells: We will certainly
consider any evidence in this respect as part of the three-year
review that is coming up. I would certainly like to look at those
particular items because I would maintain that our primary tool
in this respect is to look at end-use and to look at the whole
panoply of intelligence and evidence that we have about the use
of weapons. I am a little wary, and always have been, about trying
to have a list of weapons which exclude others, but I will certainly
look at it.
Q256 Sir John Stanley: Minister,
could we put it to you that this is not an issue that, certainly
so far as this Committee is concerned, could wait for a further
review of an unknown length of time since the last secondary legislation
was passed. All the departments concerned are fully aware of the
evidence that has been put in front of this Committee, and the
legislative change that we are seeking is one that is achievable
by secondary legislation and it simply awaits a policy decision
by ministers. Can you not take such a policy decision and do so
in this session?
Mr Moore: The Committee are aware
of the issue of extraterritoriality and the legal difficulties
that are involved in extraterritoriality. When we get into that
territory it has to be items of the most extreme concern in order
for us to work through and be clear on which items are of the
greatest concern, because extraterritoriality can get us into
major problems with other countries. We would need to look at
that very carefully and we have looked at it carefully up to now,
but at this point we have not come to the conclusion that those
particular items are the ones where we move into extraterritoriality
and, as the Minister says, there is the three year review.
Q257 Sir John Stanley: Minister,
can I just ask you to respond to this point? The issue has been
raised about legal difficulties; is it not the case, Minister,
that the Government has already extended, notwithstanding the
legal difficulties, the principle of extraterritoriality to drug-trafficking
and child abuse and if it can be done in those areas, in a much
more defined area like the export of MANPADs, surely the legal
difficulties are very much less than what the Government has already
successfully surmounted in the two other areas I have just referred
to.
Dr Howells: Point taken, Sir John,
and I will certainly undertake to look at that.
Q258 Chairman: Can I turn to another
issue that the Committee has been concerned about and raised when
Malcolm Wicks gave evidence to the Committee in relation to the
Export Control Organisation, and it is the policy issue about
dual use. You will be aware that we have taken evidence concerning
the exports of Land Rover flat-packs to Turkey that were then
transformed into military vehicles that were then used by Uzbek
troops during the Andijan massacre in May of last year. My question
is, once the EU embargo was imposed on arms exports to Uzbekistan
in December of last year, was it the intention then of the UK
Government to prevent such an embargoed destination getting access
to equipment of that kind that would support its security services?
Dr Howells: Land Rover of course—and
I am sure you are aware of this, Mr Berry—supplied flat-pack
civil Land Rover Defenders to a Turkish company which was called
Otokar, who then assembled the cars, adding its own products and
components before selling them to the Turkish Government under
its own name. The Turkish Government then gifted these vehicles
to the Uzbek Government under a joint counter-terrorism agreement.
Those vehicles were not Land Rover approved products. Under the
EC Dual-Use Regulation and our own domestic legislation the UK
has no power to control the export of civilian specification Land
Rovers. The export of civilian vehicles, converted by a Turkish
company, using its own technology and without UK involvement is
a matter for Turkish export controls. It is a difficult case,
certainly, but I hope that that clarifies the situation.
Q259 Chairman: Do you not agree that
under Article 4.2 of the Dual-Use Regulation there is a "catch-all"
provision in relation to the supply of dual-use goods to embargoed
destinations, and I quote: "An authorisation shall also be
required for the export of dual-use items [intended for military
end-use] not listed in Annex 1 if the purchasing country or country
of destination is subject to an arms embargo . . ." Do not
the Dual-Use Regulations apply in precisely this case, after the
embargo had been announced—clearly not before, but once
the embargo had been announced?
Dr Howells: This is hindsight,
of course, because when Land Rover sold those civilian flat-pack
Land Rover Defenders to Turkey we had no way of knowing that the
Turkish Government was going to gift considerably modified Land
Rovers to the Uzbeks, and that is a very difficult situation in
those circumstances.
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