This article is written by Gitika Jain pursuing BBA.LLB (Hons) from Amity University, Kolkata. This is an exhaustive article which deals with illicit arms trafficking in Africa.

Introduction

Illicit trading in small arms and light weapons is dynamic, opaque and amorphous in Africa and elsewhere. Across Africa, there has been a global enterprise with illicit weapons, that are virtually from every major country in the world. There has been a small survey conducted on the value of illicit small arms trade at US dollar 1 billion that is equal to 10 to 20% of the global trade. These estimates have not been confirmed because it is very uneasy due to the clandestine nature of the trade, but one can surely be obvious about the fact that illicit trade in small arms is carried out in Africa on many levels. 

Sources of the arms

There are some countries in Africa that have validity to produce arms and ammunitions and amongst them South Africa is on the top list. The South African industry produces the small component of arms and includes less than 10 manufacturers. This information are not even significant if taken into consideration with the global small arms trade. Only a limited number of African manufacturers of arms and ammunition are able to enter the illegal market because of the strict regulations and control of the national government on African manufacturers. There are even stealing of small arms and seizing them by the government forces, the correct soldiers in the government force purchase or loot even from private owners of the arms.

Rebel arsenals are the result of peacekeepers being relieved of their small arms. One example of this can be found in Sierra Leonean with more than not 550 reptans that also included two terms of ammunition, machine guns, rocket, propelled grenades and assault rifles. These kinds of rebels and armed groups were the major sources from which the illicit small arms were produced. According to a UN investigator, a rebel called Somalia Militias was involved in regular buying of arms and ammunition and selling them in local black markets.

In some of the areas of Africa, the source of illicit small arms is the unauthorised craft production of firearms by local gunsmiths. Emmanuel Kwesi conducted a study of craft production in Ghana and found out that the unlicensed gunsmiths of the country have the capacity to produce 200000 firearms per year, where some of those produce have the quality of produce which is similar to that of industrially produced guns. The neighbouring States Government and armed groups are also found to be the source of illicit small arms. The original war that was the result of civil conflicts in Africa with the neighbouring countries provided material support to many parties to the conflict. The support even included a large number of illicit small arms. From the year 2000, the US investigators have found the transfer of weapons by the neighbouring governments to the illicit armed groups in Somalia which is the democratic republic of Congo, Liberia, Sierra, Leone and Sudan and all these are under UN arms embargoes. The arms trafficking even took place cross-border by the members of armed groups. 

There was a survey conducted on the small arms, which was of the opinion that the Librarian rebels crossed the insecure Ivorian border to conduct trade of the weapons for motorcycles. Another anecdotal evidence suggested that the group who smuggled weapons into Mali and Ghana for food and other consumer goods was the member of Forces Nouvelles. an Ivorian rebel group. Africa also received ship weapons illicitly by arms traffickers from other continents. There were researchers named Wood and Peleman, according to whom the illicit small arms that were used in Africa mainly originated from China, Israel and 20 OSCE members. 

There were two assumptions that were made about this that either they were the part of the large scale weapons shipment to a rebel movement at the time of cold war or they were the recent supplies from huge function busting shipments that were organised by Merchant Of Death (the globetrotting arms broker who was specialised in delivery of weapons to war zones and dictators illicitly). The investigators of UN Hoover, for summarising their findings around July, 2000, reviewed those shipments and found 715 boxes that included 25 rocket-propelled grenades, 50 machine guns, 3000 assault rifles, and several other anti-tank and anti-craft missiles. 

Routes and methods of trafficking

The fact that small arms are light in weight, durable and concealable, there can be various ways in which it can be smuggled. The illicit transfer of those small arms were possible by foot or by truck through long, observant and poorly guarded land borders. Such was the method to transfer illicit small arms that they took place on a huge scale and in a systematic manner. The documentary of the delivery of arms to so many military services by truck convoy was done through a UN expert investigating team. A similar instance can be drawn when Liberia’s Charles Taylor transported weapons to RUF in trucks across the border.

Even some rebel soldiers and refugees cross borders with small arms one at a time. Smuggling of small arms even took place across Africa’s rivers and coasts. According to researchers, from a small arms survey, a claim has been made that smugglers of Malian arms packed the arms and ammunition to be transported into waterproof sacks and attach them to the bottom of the boats leaving them upon the Niger river. Usage of dhows (large wooden vessels with triangular sails) was made to deliver the small arms in large quantities from Yemen to Somalia.

The dhow reportedly delivered assault rifles, grenade launchers and machine guns according to UN investigators. Another medium through which the transportation of illicit arms were made in Africa was by using fairy weapons by aircraft intercontinentally and regionally. Even the military cargo planes were an important source to arrange the transfer of such arms by international brokers. All the transfers that are made illegally were a complex procedure that consisted of false paperwork and loose connection of brokers and corrupt officials from different parts of the country. The July 2000 shipment of Ukrainian to Ivory coast is an example of the same, which was investigated by a UN panel of experts. That shipment consisted of 5 million cartridges. 

The broker involved in that case provided the sanction of Ukrainian Government with the authentication and certificate and those allowed the military officers to fly with the ammunition. The name of the broker was Aviatrend, which was Moscow based. The plane as expected reached on 15th July in the Ivory Coast and thereafter the boxes of ammunition were unloaded from the plane and delivered to Charles Taylor. That deal was partially arranged by Ukrainian arms dealer Leonid Minin. But soon after that he was arrested in Italy on drug and prostitution charges. There were even first copies of original certificates found in the hotel room of Mining. 

Consequences

The survey of small arms estimated that illicit small arms resulted in the death of thousands and millions of injuries per year. Though the exact total is unknown but in few African countries the reliable data was available. In certain African countries the emergence of gun culture was the result of availability of small arms. The social legal system of norms and values in Africa were highly affected. The gun culture in some parts of Africa eventually resulted in a perception of armed violence especially in areas like eastern provinces of the democratic republic of Congo and Somalia. Intensification of inter-community tensions and conflicts in Africa even arose as a result of illicit small arms, for example, the low scale cattle rustling which have been one of the most important features in rural life of eastern Africa for centuries were destroyed because of illicit small arms. Hundreds of people were killed during that era. Poaching activities were also connected with small arms in areas near wild parks and sanctuaries. 

Controlling strategies

Myriad small arms control and disarmament strategies implemented at the national sub-regional and regional levels of Africa to control the measures guided by small arms agreement of international and regional areas. The most effective control strategy has been the Bamako Declaration 2000, which represented the position on trafficking and illicit small arms of Africa. At sub-regional level, usually regional economic communities negotiate arms control agreements such as the South African development community. The objective of those agreements were to make illicit arms production and possession a criminal offence, destroy the surplus stock of weapons and introduce new control measures. Many African States have created National Focal Points NFPs which was the body coordinating and taking responsibility of national arms control action plan and facilitating research monitoring and formulation of the policies and legislation related to small arms. At the continental level there was no body to regulate the arms trade in Africa. 

The way ahead

The agreements at international and regional levels provided more than a road map for reducing illicit small arms trade globally and in Africa. The agreements were such, the implementation of which would result in significant decrease of destruction caused by illicit small arms trade. 

• Expansion of foreign aid programs that mainly targeted the illicit arms trade: There were various international organisations and individual countries which have over the past five years established these aid programmes in order to destroy surplus stock of small arms and resulted in improvement of the security of small arms storage facilities. Tons of surplus weapons were eliminated from places like Ukraine, Serbia and Romania. 
• Breakdown on violations of UN arm embargoes: Whenever violation of UN arm embargoes happened very often, the government failed to respond decisively. The failure to do so may take many evil forms, including the sale of continuous illicit arms. 
• Strengthening national arms control legislation: Arms control agreements at regional and international levels are limited and are prerogative to be implemented by amending relevant legislation and policy by African governments. 
• Addressing the factors that fuel the illicit small arms economy: African market is a combination of insecurity in equality under development and in effective governance because of illicit small arms trade. Hence, destroying small arms and bolstering national arms control will help in overcoming these issues in the long run.

Conclusion

Since most of the central African regions have suffered consequences of illicit small arms either directly or indirectly. This suffering got inculcated in the minds of the people residing there, which eventually drove them out of their villages into some other places. For them necessities are shelter, food, health care, clothing and necessary things for survival.  We all are very well aware of the fact that there are no permanent friends or no permanent force in politics. It is very obvious that today’s force may become tomorrow’s friends, today’s friends may become tomorrow’s freeze depending upon the circumstances. For example, South Africa during World War II used to be an ally of the Soviet Union but during the time of National liberation it was regarded as a threat to South Africa. Africa was awash with hundred million illicit small arms. Thus, it is evident from the above discussion that the spread of illegal arms and drugs in the African countries had led to an alarming situation. And the steps taken to control those have, to a major extent, reduced the fired-up situation caused by illicit arms trade. Thus, overcoming these challenges with arms trafficking in today’s digital age requires a lot of creative thinking and enforcement in law provisions which can for sure be achieved in the near future. 

References

• https://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/31088/11/11_chapter%205.pdf
• https://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/31088/9/09_chapter%203.pdf
• http://www.archive.mu.ac.in/arts/social_science/african_studies/biswaswp.pdf
• https://stableseas.org/maritime-terrorism-resource-portal-illicit-trades/arms-trafficking-african-waters
• https://medium.com/@SmallArmsSurvey/beyond-the-dark-web-arms-trafficking-in-the-digital-age-56ddd806587a
• http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/weapons-and-markets/transfers/illicit-trafficking.html

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