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Despite peace process, Middle East remains world's leading arms market

SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Friday, October 22, 1999

LONDON -- Despite European- and U.S.-sponsored peace efforts, the Middle East remains the world's leading arms market, a strategic report said on Thursday.

The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies said the leading powers in the region, particularly Egypt, Israel and Syria, continue to bolster their armed forces. The report says the region spends seven percent of its gross domestic product on weapons.

"The Middle East and North Africa region continues to be the world's leading arms market, both in absolute terms and as a proportion of gross domestic product," the IISS said in its annual report. "The continued growth in military spending despite economic decline is unsurprising given the continuing regional tensions."

Saudi Arabia purchased $10.4 billion of weapons last year after $11 billion in 1997, remaining the leading importer of weapons.

The institute said defense expenditures in the Middle East were reduced by five percent in 1999. The report attributed this to the collapse of the worldwide oil market, the base of many Middle East economies.

But the recovery in oil prices could result in supplemental defense budgets this year. Iranian defense spending has almost tripled since 1993. "While there have not been significant changes in Iranian military capabilities, the armed forces once again demonstrated their ability to mobilize and deploy large numbers of troops," the report said.

Israel and Egypt both took delivery of arms worth $1 billion in 1998 and the United Arab Emirates' imports were worth more than $900 million in 1998.

The institute named the United States as the world's biggest arms exporter, with foreign sales of $26.5 billion or 49 percent market share. France was in second place with $9.8 billion, followed by Britain with $9 billion, Russia $2.8 billion, Israel with $1.3 billion and China with $500 million in defense exports.

The institute said Iranian and Iraqi weapons of mass destruction programs continue to garner concern. The instability is augmented by the shakiness of the Gulf Cooperation Council states.

"Particularly notable are Qatar's increasingly independent foreign policy and challenges in the Kuwaiti parliament to the high levels of defense spending," the report said. "These developments will introduce uncertainties into defense alliances and into major arms transactions with outside powers."

The report said world arms sales held steady last year at $55.8 billion in real terms in 1998, only slightly less than the previous year's $56 billion. Arms deliveries to East Asia and Australasia actually increased slightly, and weapons sales to sub-Saharan Africa almost doubled.

"Despite the 1997-98 economic downturn in Asia and a period of weak oil prices, the arms trade did not decline by as much as had been expected," the report said.

Friday, October 22, 1999


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