War Profiteers

Following the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi Arbian embassy in Istanbul on October 2nd, Germany’s chancellor Angela Merkel announced that Germany will halt all arms sales to Saudi Arabia.

On the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons (26 September), Belgian peace groups took action against the BNP Paribas bank, because of their investments in nuclear weapons.

In Germany, activists have staged protests and blockades at the factory of arms company Rheinmetall, a huge international arms company, as part of a week long disarmament camp in Unterluss, in the north of Germany.

The Spanish government has decided to go ahead with the delivery of 400 laser guided missiles to Saudi Arabia, worth more than $10m, a few weeks after saying they would cancel the order.

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In the first week of September 2018, the president of the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte, spent four days visiting Israel. His trip was an opportunity to meet the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the thousands of Filipinos who live and work in the country… and explore opportunities to buy weapons.

As part of the European Union's Permanent Structure Cooperation framework (PESCO), Estonia, Latvia and Finland are planning to develop land-based drones to be used for planning and reconnaissance.

Journalists in Yemen and the USA have collected evidence that the missile used by the Saudi-led coalition forces to bomb a civilian bus Yemen, killing dozens of children and injuring many more, was as a 500-pound GBU-12 MK 82 laser guided missile, built by Lockheed Martin.

A new report called “A Lab and A Showroom” exposes how the extreme violence used by the Israeli military against Palestinian protesters supports the sale of military equipment by Israeli arms companies.

In the United Kingdom, campaigners have been resisting arms fairs being held in their cities. In Glasgow, dozens of activists held noisy protests outside the Undersea Defence Technology exhibition and conference, held at the cities Scottish Events Campus (SEC). In Farnborough and London, activists protested against the Farnborough International Airshow - biannual, week-long event, combining a public air show with an international trade show attended by military delegations from all over the world.

On Thursday 2nd August, over 40 artists descended on the Design Museum in London to remove their submissions. The artists and activists who contributed pieces to the exhibition were protesting against the museum hosting an event that facilitated the arms trade.

In early July, the European Parliament adopted the European Defence Industrial Development Programme (EDIDP). The programme was first proposed by the European Commission in June 2017, as part of the European Defence Fund.