Fourteen of the world’s leading human rights and humanitarian organizations are calling on the French government to “abolish France’s opacity in arms sales” and to “establish real parliamentary control.” The call comes before the publication of a parliamentary inquiry report on arms export controls to be published on 18 November.
In a joint press release, co-signed by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the International Federation for Human Rights FIDH, Oxfam and local organizations such as the Cairo Institute for Human Rights and Salam for Yemen, parliamentary scrutiny is “necessary since French arms sales have proved responsible” for certain serious humanitarian law violations, particularly in Yemen, where these violations have dramatic consequences for the civilian population.
In December 2018, the Foreign Affairs Committee of the French Parliament created a commission of inquiry into arms export controls, led by MEPs Michèle Tabarot and Jacques Maire, following public opinion and the mobilization of NGOs against French arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the United States. The United Arab Emirates, “will probably be used illegally against civilians in Yemen.”
French arms sales to Saudi Arabia were first exposed to the public by the investigative website Disclose, in a report “Made in France.”
War in Yemen
Based on leaked documents from the French military intelligence service (DRM), Disclose mapped the extent of French arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the impact it had during the war in Yemen and concluded that the widespread use of French-made Leclerc tanks and Cesar-haubits contributed to death of dozens of civilians between 2016 and 2018.
The 14 NGOs claim that France is an exception among Western democracies because Parliament has no capacity to exercise real control over the arms sales carried out by the executive, unlike the United States, the United Kingdom and Germany, where parliamentary control over arms sales is in place.
Top three arms importers
They also point out that in 2019, Saudi Arabia was among the top three countries that imported the most French weapons, while the United Arab Emirates ordered a record number of French weapons.
“And this despite their alleged responsibility for serious and repeated violations of international humanitarian law in Yemen,” the group said. As a result, “80% of the population is now in need of humanitarian aid. This is a preventable tragedy.”
“If Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden have revoked any arms deals with Riyadh, it is not only because of the war in Yemen, but also because they have put in place a democratic control mechanism that allows civil society to be heard by the rulers,” he said. Tony Fortin, head of research at the Paris-based Armed Forces Observatory, one of the co-signatories of the letter.
“Such a system does not exist in France. We must seize the opportunity in the Maire-Tabarot report to (finally!) Make progress on the subject. This calls into question the dominant position given to the executive and military logic in our society, he says.