Switzerland to review small arms exports to Sudan

BERN, Switzerland, July 04, 2004 (AP) — Switzerland will review its weapons exports to Sudan after a report claimed that Swiss companies had sold more than US$4 million of small arms to the war-torn African state in 2002.

A report published last week by the Geneva-based Graduate Institute of International Studies said that Switzerland supplied firearms worth almost US$4.3 million to Sudan in 2002. The Swiss government, however, recorded exports of revolvers and pistols worth 4,144 Swiss francs (US$3,357).

A spokeswoman for the nation’s Finance Ministry, Rita Baldegger, said Sunday that the government will investigate the inconsistencies and will contact its embassy in Sudan for customs documents and other information.

“Such trade would not have been approved by us,” Ottmar Wyss, responsible for export control at the Finance Ministry, told the Swiss weekly newspaper SonntagsBlick. “Either there is illegal export trade going on, or the numbers are wrong.”

The sale of weapons to the African country has to be approved by the Swiss finance and foreign ministries. The government has granted approval for exports of 17,000 francs (US$13,772) worth of small arms to Sudan since April 1998 for use as personal protection or sporting purposes.

Talks to end the 21-year civil war in southern Sudan _ the longest in Africa _ began in neighboring Kenya in 2002. More than 2 million people have perished in that war, mainly through conflict-induced famine.

Thousands more people have been killed and more than 1 million forced from their homes in a separate conflict in Sudan’s western region of Darfur, prompting a humanitarian crisis as people flee to neighboring Chad.