Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)

Is the Minister concerned that the amount of funds committed to development is about 5% of the annual expenditure on armaments? Some EU countries, including participants in the recent Edinburgh summit, are major exporters of arms, in particular to African countries and sources of conflict. It is not a matter of export being a neutral measure. Arms make their way to third countries through, for example, Yemen with the practical co-operation of countries such as the United Kingdom, Sweden, Germany, France and Italy. These are all leading countries in the discourse on development.

The European Union speaks at the United Nations with ashes in its mouth when it has expanded its production and sale of armaments even into conflict zones and at the same time has not completed its review of the 1998 EU code of conduct on transfer of arms. Nor is it implementing an induced requirement, by which I mean allowing armaments, particularly from small companies, into the system without assuming responsibility for where they will eventually be used.

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