Information
Fifth Meeting of the Regional Information Exchange Process on Arms Export Controls
The meeting began with the presentation given by the BiH delegation, informing the participants about the work of BiH as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council. The next issue discussed was the development of a regional database of registered arms brokers. Delegations agreed to revise and provide the updated lists of registered brokers to SEESAC. BiH will conduct an industry outreach in the fall of 2011 where it will seek an agreement by the industry to share information for the regional database.
The delegations also discussed the improvement of the regional report on arms exports by including information on 1) brokering licenses granted and refused by each country; as well as 2) the implementing legislation or administrative rules for Common Position 2003/468/CFSP and Common Position 2008/944/CFSP. It was noted that it would be useful if the regional report includes the criteria based on which licenses were refused. The Serbian delegation expressed its view that at the moment the Republic of Serbia is not able to report on the granted and refused brokering licenses for the reason that the Republic of Serbia does not issue specific licenses for brokering. The Serbian delegation suggested not to include such information into the regional report yet.
Further the Delegations discussed exports to specific destinations; the available tools for post-export control; and options for establishing Internal Compliance Programs (ICP).
For the benefit of full transparency, the delegations agreed to present the second regional report on arms exports at a joint press conference during the next meeting. The next Regional Arms Exports Information Exchange meeting was tentatively scheduled for 9-10 November 2011 and is to be held in Belgrade.
The activity is supported by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.