US and UK failing to monitor flood of arms into Iraq, Amnesty warns

[struggle4progress]

THURSDAY, 18 SEPTEMBER 2008
The Guardian Online

Iraq is being flooded with weapons despite human rights violations by all parties in the conflict there, and without any proper monitoring by the US and Britain over where the weapons end up, Amnesty International says today.

There is no clear accountable audit trail for some 360,000 small arms supplied to the Iraqi security forces, many by the US and UK, it says.

Subcontracting makes the arms trade even less transparent. Among examples cited by Amnesty are the supply of 63,800 Kalashnikov assault rifles from Bosnia to Iraq and the dispatch via the UK of thousands of Italian Beretta pistols, many of which ended up in the hands of al-Qaida insurgents in Iraq.

"The easy availability of small arms and lack of accountability in Iraq has contributed to sectarian killings by armed groups, as well as torture and other ill-treatment; extra-judicial executions by Iraqi government forces and the continuing arbitrary detention of thousands of suspects by Iraqi soldiers backed by US armed forces since 2003," says Amnesty ...

http://www.independent-bangladesh.com/200809189973/international/us-and-uk-failing-to-monitor-flood-of-arms-into-iraq-amnesty-warns.html