Wüstenschiff

This report is the result of six years of collaborative investigations and documents the distribution of Iranian ammunition in Africa. It is the first comprehensive study of Iran’s weapons ‘footprint’ in Africa and its findings are significant, not least because until very recently most international observers would have described Iran’s role in this market as negligible to non-existent. [...] The report concludes that Iran is a recent supplier of ammunition to Africa. Despite this, its ammunition ‘footprint’ in the continent is widespread. The 14 cases presented in this report are evidence of this alone and indicate that ammunition circulates in conflict-affected regions stretching from East to West Africa [...] The report notes that African arms markets are evolving, with new suppliers and new supply vectors—both legal and illicit. However, the international community is currently hampered in its responses to illicit weapons proliferation, primarily because it lacks the monitoring capacity to understand illicit transfers fully and, on this basis, to develop appropriate counter-proliferation strategies. The report calls for international donors to invest greater resources in field-based investigations.