§ The Minister for Europe(Mr. Denis MacShane)Man-Portable Air Defence Systems (MANPADS) are surface to air missiles, usually shoulder-launched and fired by an individual or more than one individual, acting as a crew. The Government are committed to preventing them from falling into the wrong hands. They are designed for military air defence use, but, in the hands of terrorists, they have been, and could again be, used against civil aviation. The House will recall that in November 2002 in Mombasa terrorists only narrowly missed downing a commercial aircraft using such a weapon.
The international community is responding to this threat by a range of actions including strengthening export controls on MANPADS. The Prime Minister and other G8 Leaders, meeting at Evian in June 2003, expressed their deep concern about the threat posed to civil aviation by MANPADS, especially in the hands of terrorists or countries that harbour them. The G8 meeting agreed an Action Plan to Enhance Transport Security and Control of MANPADS. The Action Plan contains five measures, including an agreement to: "ban the transfer of MANPADS to non-state end users, MANPADS should only be exported to foreign governments or to agents authorised by a Government"
The Government assess export licence applications on a case-by-case basis against the Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing Criteria. This involves considering amongst other factors, the risk of diversion or re-export under undesirable conditions. including to terrorists. The Consolidated Criteria also provide that the Government will not issue an export licence if approval would be inconsistent with the UK's international commitments regarding the application of strategic export controls.
Taking the criterion of UK adherence to international commitments into account, the Government will therefore consider any licence applications for the export of MANPADS to any non-government body in the light of the G8 Action Plan commitment mentioned above. This is consistent with our current export control practice.
In the case of any licence application for the export of MANPADS to Governments or to any agents authorised by governments, the Government's assessment under the Consolidated Criteria will also be informed by consideration of the proposed export 30WS against the "Elements for Export Controls of Man-Portable Air Defence Systems (MANPADS)" agreed in the Wassenaar Arrangement on Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies. These provide that exports of MANPADS may only take place if a range of strict conditions to prevent diversion or leakage of these weapons to unauthorised end-users are met. This document is available at http:// www.wassenaar.org/. The Government are playing an active role in discussions to update and strengthen the Wassenaar document.
The Action Plan also commits G8 countries to "ensure strong national regulation of production, transfer and brokering" (of MANPADS). The Government's secondary legislation under the Export Control Act 2002, laid before Parliament on 31 October 2003, implements this commitment. This legislation introduces controls on the brokering of all equipment on the UK's military list, including MANPADS, where any part of the transaction is carried out in the United Kingdom. It represents a very significant step in preventing the involvement of UK persons in undesirable arms transfers. To counter the terrorist threat from MANPADS the Government will decide over the next few months whether anything further needs to be done to control brokering of these weapons.