arms trade

On the 29th of May Clarion Events announced the acquisition of Defence Systems and Equipment International (DSEi), Latin American Aerospace and Defence Exhibition (LAAD) and ITEC.

DSEi - The largest arms fair in the world takes place in London every two years. The previous owners of DSEi and the other two exhibitions, Reed Elsevier,which is a major publisher of scientific publications, had to sell DSEi after a high profile campaign against it.

En un período de apenas 10 años, comprendidos entre 1998 y 2007, Venezuela subió del lugar 56 al puesto 24 en el ranking mundial de mayores compradores de armamento convencional. Estos datos fueron recientemente difundidos por el Instituto Internacional de Estudios para la Paz de Estocolmo (SIPRI), cuya base de datos acerca de la transferencia de armas en el planeta se ha convertido en una referencia para monitorear los procesos de militarización global.

On 10 th March 2008, the Court of Appeal in The Hague cleared Guus Van Kouwenhoven, a " member of [Charles] Taylor's Inner Circle, " of breaking the United Nations arms embargo enforced against Liberia.

" The barbaric regime of Charles Taylor was financed and maintained by the revenues generated from the timber trade, in which Guus Van Kouwenhoven was the biggest player.

Eurosatory is with DSEi in London the biggest arms trade fair in the world. A few figures to show how bit it is. In 2006, there were over one thousand exhibitors from 47 countries displaying military equipments to 48 thousand visitors from 167 countries, amongst them 110 official delegations from 67 countries and nearly 600 journalists.

From the 31 of March to the 4 of April in Santiago, Chile , there was an arms fair: FIDAE, is a fair that focuses on the aerospace defence

area. FIDAE also welcomes civilian exhibitors but essentially the fair has a military focus. This fair is one of the biggest and most important of its kind in Latin America and is a mayor event for the arms traders to make business in the region. This year's fair hosted

the 11th edition of the meeting of Logistic Commanders of the Air Forces of South America.

The High Court the 10th of April ruled that the Director of the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) acted unlawfully when he stopped a corruption investigation into BAE Systems' arms deals with Saudi Arabia.

The judgment was handed down by Lord Justice Moses and Mr Justice Sullivan in response to a judicial review brought by Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) and The Corner House.

In the light of this judgment, the Serious Fraud Office must reopen the BAE-Saudi corruption investigation immediately.

It has a been busy times for the movement against war profiteering as you will read in this edition of WPN. We congratulate the work done by CAAT and The Corner House, with their court victory that ruled that the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) acted unlawfully when he stopped a corruption investigation into BAE Systems' arms deals with Saudi Arabia. At the same time the fact that a documentary exposing the arms trade was censored in the UK shows the level of impact that the Smash EDO Campaign has had.

Aluminium's countless applications in modern civilian life tend to mask its numerous uses in weapons technology, which make it one of a handful of metals classed as “strategic” by the Pentagon, meaning that a top priority of the world's most powerful Governments is to ensure its constant supply at lowest possible cost.

Disarm UCL is a campaign in the UK which has widespread support among University College London students, staff and alumni. UCL Student Union fully supports the campaign.

It aims to get UCL to divest its shares in arms company Cobham plc, which profits significantly from the sale of military components. Cobham plc is the world's 46th largest arms producer by military revenue. UCL as a major university sets an important precedent for the whole sector.

The Defexpo India exhibition was conceptualised in the year 1998 by the Department of Defence Production, Ministry of Defence Government of India in partnership with the Confederation of Indian Industry with an objective to promote defence exports from India at the same time exhibit the capabilities of Indian Defence R&D and production.

On the 15th of November 2007, Rio Tinto Canada Holding, an indirect owned subsidiary of Rio Tinto – one of the biggest mining corporation in the world – acquired all of the common shares of Alcan world leading producer of aluminium.

The Arms and Security Initiative offers a regular E-Newsletter covering the arms trade, military budget developments and foreign policy issues. It is punchy -- informative and stimulating without being too wonky or too gloomy. It will also include their new feature: “What's Good,” which will highlight successes, victories and great ideas.

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