The European Union and Conventional Arms Transfers

The European Union and Conventional Arms Export Controls

The European Union as an organization plays no direct role in managing the conventional arms transfers into or out of member states. EU legislation (article 296 (EC)) makes it clear that member states may exempt arms production and arms trade from EU common rules.

Article 296 (at that time known as article 223) was not changed in the Treaty revisions at Maastricht, Amsterdam and Nice. EU member states want conventional arms transfer policy and practice to be decided nationally. Further information on national arms transfer laws and policies is available here.

Nevertheless, the EU has become an important forum in which member states discuss national policies and multilateral cooperation in areas related to conventional arms transfers. Since the 1990s Member States have:

• Agreed criteria that members will take into account in their national decision making. These criteria have been developed into a Code of Conduct that some Member States have incorporated into their national arms export legislation, and published Annual Reports (pdf) on the Code's implementation and a corresponding User's Guide (pdf);
• Recognized that coherence is desirable in implementing agreed measures, including arms embargoes, and established procedures to facilitate gradual harmonization;
• Produced and circulated national reports on arms export policies and practices;
• Recognized that the industrial and technological base required to maintain a defence industry able to deliver equipment of the latest generation can usefully be discussed in the EU framework;
• Begun to elaborate a programme to combat illicit arms trafficking;
• Enhanced their information sharing, including the circulation of information about national decisions to deny export licences for items subject to the Code of Conduct;
• Agreed a number of small arms initiatives;
• Agreed on a joint action on anti-personnel landmines;
• Agreed measures to harmonise and improve brokering controls;
• Co-operated on arms transfers issues in third fora such as the UN and discussed export controls with third countries (EU-US, EU-Canada, EU-Africa etc.);
• The European Parliament's role in arms export policy has also increased over the years.

Two working groups under the Council of Ministers discuss these issues.

COARM -- The working group on conventional arms (COARM) plays the central role in the discussion of arms transfer issues within the EU.

POLARM -- The working group on armaments policy (POLARM) has examined whether the trade in military equipment between member states could be simplified. For example, in the framework of cooperative programmes that only involve EU member states, whether the process of exchanging articles and technologies between members of an industrial project team could be made more straightforward? This discussion has examined three aspects of simplified procedures for internal trade in military equipment: the impact on economic policy, on export policy and on procurement policy.