UK Parliament Issues Export Controls Quarterly Report

The UK Parliament issued its quarterly report on export controls this week, Scrutiny of Arms Export Controls (2011): UK Strategic Export Controls Annual Report 2009, Quarterly Reports for 2010, licensing policy and review of export control legislation. Prepared by several Committee of the House of Commons, it details government policy on arms exports, enforcement, as well as whether the government is meeting its export control policy goals. 

Among the recommendations:

1. That the government conduct a full review of the case for a pre-licence register of arms brokers;
2. That the government review current laws and regulations with regards to military end-use controls;
3. That the government consider industry's concerns and make public the criteria used for imposing civil penalties and how the amounts of such penalties are calculated; and
4. Requests that the government assesses the risk that individual arms exports may be linked to bribery and corruption during the licence approval process.

Under a section titled "Countries of Concern," the Committees detail transactions to Israel, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and China and states that the government may have "misjudged the risk that arms approved for export to certain authoritarian countries in North Africa and the Middle East might be used for internal repression."

You can download the complete report from the House of Commons website.