| SIPRI Update: Global Security & Arms Control | September 2008 |
Welcome to the September 2008 issue of SIPRI Update: Global Security & Arms Control. This monthly newsletter is your source for the latest developments in international security, arms control, non-proliferation and conflict, including recent SIPRI activities and publications.
In this issue:
| Pakistan on the precipice? | Back to top |
Graham Williams, Senior Research Officer, British Foreign and Commonwealth Office
The election on 6 September of Asif Ali Zardari as president formally ended Pakistan’s drawn out, divisive and violence-marred return to civilian rule. That process began in March 2007 when then president and army chief, Pervez Musharraf, dismissed the Supreme Court judges who looked set to challenge his eligibility for re-election. The lie of the political land in Pakistan seems broadly settled but is unsettling: a partisan president with unprecedented powers for a civilian; a new but brittle governing coalition led by the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP); the opposition in contested control of Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous and wealthy province; and a politically disengaged military. This dispensation, however, is unlikely to last.
| SIPRI Yearbook 2008: summaries available in five languages | Back to top |
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In addition to the English summary booklet, SIPRI Yearbook 2008 is now available summarized in Dutch, German, Spanish and Swedish. Summaries in Catalan and French are currently in preparation. More on SIPRI Yearbook 2008, including ordering information, is available at yearbook2008.sipri.org. |
| Recent SIPRI events | Back to top |
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22 September |
Afghanistan: Rebuilding the Security Sector—Progress and Ownership This conference, hosted by SIPRI and the Estonian Embassy in Stockholm, was convened to take stock of the ongoing efforts to increase Afghan ownership of the security sector—in particular the transfer of responsibility to the Afghan security forces—within the context of a continually deteriorating security situation. The conference was attended by experts and policymakers, including Estonian Defence Minister Jaak Aaviksoo, Afghan ambassador to Scandinavia Jawed Ludin and Estonian ambassador to Afghanistan Harri Tiido, among many others. Contact Tim Foxley for more information |
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8–10 September |
World Forum Against Drugs In partnership with the EastWest Institute and the Swedish Carnegie Institute, SIPRI co-organized a panel on narcoterrorism at the World Forum Against Drugs. SIPRI Armed Conflicts and Conflict Management Project Leader Dr Ekaterina Stepanova delivered a presentation on this topic. |
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11–12 August |
Drug Consumption, Trafficking and Production: The Search for a New Thinking Dr Ekaterina Stepanova represented SIPRI to participate in this international conference sponsored by the Corporacion Andina de Fomento (CAF), a multilateral financial institution focused on sustainable development work in Latin America. Dr Stepanova delivered a presentation entitled ‘Armed conflicts and illicit drugs: the nature and limits of the links’. Contact Ekaterina Stepanova for more details |
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| SIPRI in the media | Back to top |
SIPRI Governing Board Member Jayantha Dhanapala discussed the latest trends in arms control and disarmament with La Stampa.
SIPRI Project Leader Zdzislaw Lachowski, Project Leader Siemon Wezeman, Senior Guest Researcher Gunilla Herolf and Researcher Petter Stålenheim spoke to the Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal, International Herald Tribune, and Sydsvenska Dagbladet, respectively, regarding the recent developments in the Georgia–Russia conflict.
SIPRI Research Associate Catalina Perdomo participated in a debate on the issue of arms build-up in South America with Latin American news programme Oppenheimer Presenta.
Figures from the SIPRI Arms Transfers Database and the SIPRI Military Expenditure Database were cited by the International Herald Tribune, The Boston Globe, Miami Herald, El País (in Spanish), The Australian, Kommersant, National Defense Magazine, and UNESCO Social and Human Sciences Sector Magazine, among many others.
| SIPRI fact of the month | Back to top |
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Trends point to rapidly rising military expenditure in the South Caucasus |
The combined military expenditure of the three South Caucasian countries—Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia—has increased by more than 500 per cent in real terms over the 10-year period 1998–2007 and by 285 per cent over the five years 2003–2007. In particular, Georgia’s military expenditure has increased more than tenfold in real terms since 2003. After Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili took office in January 2004, military expenditure increased at an unprecedented rate: 40, 166, 69 and 64 per cent, respectively, for each of the years 2004–2007. Georgia also receives military aid from several NATO members, with the bulk coming from the USA. In 2002 Washington provided more than $34 million in military aid, equal to 70 per cent of Georgia’s domestic military spending. Of this, $20 million was given specifically to enable the Georgian armed forces to deal with Chechen rebels in the Pankisi Gorge. In 2006 and 2007 US military aid amounted to approximately $10 million. These findings can be found in SIPRI Yearbook 2008. |
| SIPRI’s latest publications | Back to top |
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The private military services industry SIPRI Insights on Peace and Security no. 2008/1 Sam Perlo-Freeman and Elisabeth Sköns SIPRI | 20 pp. | September 2008 Download from http://books.sipri.org/ |
The trend towards increased outsourcing of military activities has led to a rapid expansion of the military services segment of the arms industry in recent decades. Military services as defined here include technical services such as information technology and equipment maintenance, operational support such as facilities management and logistics, and actual armed ‘security’ in conflict zones. Some of the demand for the latter comes not from ‘outsourcing’ as such, but from internal conflict situations where state capacity is weak or absent. This paper discusses the background to the growth of the military services industry and presents an overview of the different types of military service, the size of the market and the companies involved.
The continuing expansion of the private military services industry raises many issues. The view that outsourcing is economically efficient can be challenged on a number of grounds, not least when these services are provided in operationally deployed contexts. The involvement of private companies in assisting military operations in armed conflict situations such as Iraq also raises serious concerns about the democratic accountability of armed forces, the status of civilian contractors in military roles, and the political influence of companies that have a vested interest in the continuation of the conflict.
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SIPRI Yearbook 2008 Armaments, Disarmament and International Security Stockholm International Peace Research Institute Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of SIPRI ISBN 978-0-19-954895-8 ISSN 0953-0282 hardback 604 pp. £85/$150 Order from the OUP website (UK or USA) or from all good bookshops and online booksellers |
The SIPRI Yearbook is a compendium of data and analysis in the areas of
- Security and conflicts
- Military spending and armaments
- Non-proliferation, arms control and disarmament
Highlights of the 39th edition include special studies on
- a call to arms control
- the human security approach to direct and structural violence
- integrating gender in post-conflict security sector reform
- US ballistic missile defence programmes
- nuclear forensic analysis
- international public health diplomacy and the global surveillance of avian influenza
along with coverage of developments during 2007 in
- Euro-Atlantic security institutions and relationships
- armed conflicts
- peace operations
- military expenditure
- arms production
- international arms transfers
- nuclear arms control and non-proliferation
- world nuclear forces and fissile material stocks
- reducing security threats from chemical and biological materials
- conventional arms control
- controls on security-related international transfers
SIPRI Yearbook 2008 also has extensive annexes on arms control and disarmament agreements, international organizations and intergovernmental bodies, and a chronology of events during 2007 in the area of security and arms control.
Click here for SIPRI Yearbook 2008 ordering details.
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Transparency in Transfers of Small Arms and Light Weapons: Reports to the United Nations Register of Conventional Arms, 2003–2006
SIPRI Policy Paper no. 22 Paul Holtom Published by SIPRI July 2008 Download from books.sipri.org |
The UN General Assembly’s decision in 2003 to invite member states to provide information on transfers of small arms and light weapons (SALW) to the UN Register of Conventional Arms (UNROCA) has led to a notable increase in the level of transparency in transfers of SALW. This Policy Paper is the first study to document and analyse information on SALW transfers reported to UNROCA for 2003–2006. It finds that, while the level of reporting on light weapons to UNROCA was fairly steady for the years 2003–2006, a significant increase in submissions of background information followed the introduction of a standardized reporting form for 2006.
Despite this noteworthy increase, UNROCA still only captures a fraction of international SALW transfers and transparency in transfers of SALW continues to lag behind that of other conventional weapons. The findings and recommendations of this Policy Paper throw light on the continuing debate over how the coverage of UNROCA can be expanded.
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New in paperback Humanitarian Military Intervention: The Conditions for Success and Failure Taylor B. Seybolt Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of SIPRI January 2007/July 2008 ISBN 978-0-19-925243-5 hardback £40/$99 ISBN 978-0-19-955105-7 paperback £19.99/$39.95 Order from the OUP website (UK or USA) |
This study focuses on the questions of when and how military intervention in conflicts can achieve humanitarian benefits. It uses the standard that an intervention should do more good than harm to evaluate the successes and failures. The author develops a methodology to determine the number of lives saved, as a minimalist measure. The analysis of 19 military operations in the 6 case studies of Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo and East Timor reveals both successful and unsuccessful interventions in the same locations. The study posits that an intervention’s short-term effectiveness depends primarily on six factors within the control of the intervener, rather than factors inherent within the conflict. Political and humanitarian dimensions are combined to create a typology that compares the needs of populations suffering from conflict with an intervener’s military intervention strategies, motives, capabilities and response time. Hypotheses derived from the model are tested in the case studies and policy implications are offered.
For information on SIPRI’s other recent and forthcoming books, visit the SIPRI Publications website, books.sipri.org
Other recent publications by SIPRI authors
Ian Anthony, ‘Civilian nuclear cooperation with India: implications for the Nuclear Suppliers Group’, European Security Review, September 2008, pp. 16–21. Read this article here
Mark Bromley and Michael Brzoska, ‘Towards a common, restrictive EU arms export policy?: The impact of the EU Code of Conduct on major conventional arms exports’, European Foreign Affairs Review, vol. 13, no. 3 (2008), pp. 333–56. Read this article here
Vitaly Fedchenko, ‘Testing times: doubts hang over nuclear test ban treaty’, Jane’s Intelligence Review, September 2008. Read this article here (requires subscription)
Bates Gill, J. Stephen Morrison and Chin-hao Huang, ‘China–Africa Relations: an early, uncertain debate in the United States’, China Returns to Africa: A Rising Power and a Continent Embrace (Hurst Publishers: London, 2008). Read more here
Jean-Yves Haine, ‘Assessing the EU’s capacity for military action’, European Union and Crisis Management (Asser Press: The Hague, 2008).
Ekaterina Stepanova, ‘Radicalization of Muslim Immigrants in Europe and Russia: beyond terrorism’, PONARS Eurasia Policy Memo, no. 29 (August 2008). Read this article here
Donald C. F. Daniel, Patricia Taft and Sharon Wiharta (eds.), Peace Operations: Trends, Progress, and Prospects (Georgetown University Press: Washington, DC, September 2008). Read more about this book here