South Africa’s conventional arms exports nearly doubled between 2000 and 2002, according to a government paper referred to the parliamentary defence portfolio committee and joint standing committee on defence.
According to the paper, total arms exports amounted to R1,38-billion in 2000. This rose to R1,73-billion in 2001 and rose again to R2,56-billion in 2002.
A notable change in the listing is that South Africa sold no arms to Zimbabwe in the past two years — 2001 and 2002 — although it did sell R14,3-million-worth of category D supplies to that country in 2000 in the year that Zimbabwe held a troubled constitutional referendum and parliamentary elections.
Category D is “non-lethal equipment” according to the paper — limited to “purposely designed demining, mine-clearing and mine-detecting equipment and all non-lethal pyrotechnical and riot control products”.
Its neighbours, Zambia and Mozambique, however, are the recipients of substantial arms exports from South Africa. In 2002 Mozambique bought R2,6-million-worth of category A equipment and R700 000-worth of category C equipment.
Zambia bought R24-million-worth of category C equipment in 2002.
Category A is conventional implements of war such as explosives, large calibre arms and automatic weapons, guns and missiles, bombs and grenades, tanks, fighter aircraft, attack helicopters and naval vessels “that could cause severe casualties and major damage and destruction”, according to the description derived from the Notice in Relation to Armaments Control published in the Government Gazette of August 1996.
Category C equipment is a general category and comprises support equipment usually employed in the direct support of combat systems or operations “but that have no inherent capability to kill or to destruct”.
It includes electronic, radio and communication equipment, systems such as flight control, tactical observation, propulsion, missile tracking and guidance, weapon-firing, sights and transport equipment for logistical support. — I-Net Bridge