Opportunities to enhance international cooperation to counter the role of brokering in the diversion of conventional arms.

The knotted gun


The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) seeks to establish the highest possible common international standards for regulating or improving the regulation of the conventional arms trade. The ATT process therefore provides an opportunity for states parties and other interested stakeholders to cooperate and work towards the establishment of systemic measures to prevent diversion of arms that is facilitated by illicit brokering and brokers. Such measures are considered “mechanisms or comprehensive arrangements that are established and maintained [by states] for national control systems and international cooperation to prevent, detect, address, and eradicate diversion” of arms facilitated by illicit brokering activities. In addition to the ATT, the United Nations Firearms Protocol requires its states parties to establish measures to regulate brokering of firearms, their parts and components, and ammunition. States parties to both instruments are encouraged to include information on brokers in their information exchanges as part of international cooperative efforts to counter diversion and trafficking.There are several ways in which this could be carried forwards within the ATT framework. 

First, the ATT provides an opportunity for states parties to voluntarily exchange information on brokers they have registered,and/or authorized/licensed in line with their national control systems and regulations. Several states parties already make information on registered and/or authorized/licensed brokers publicly available online. A more systematic exchange of this information between ATT states parties could be useful for national diversion risk assessments. This would help states parties’ competent authorities to determine the reliability and legitimacy of intermediaries (e.g., brokers) involved in proposed transactions. This, in turn, could help build trust and confidence between states parties. 

Second, ATT states parties could be encouraged – where their national legal systems include laws and regulations that allow it – to voluntarily share information on brokers that have been convicted by national courts of violating national laws and regulations on the conventional arms trade, illicit brokering activities and related offences. Such an exchange of information could help to prevent a broker who has been convicted in one country for illicit arms brokering activities seeking to pursue the same or similar illicit activities in another country. More research and analysis of trends regarding convicted illicit brokers could yield insights that could contribute to a better understanding of the scope of the globalproblem of illicit arms brokering and illicit armsand ammunition flows, as well as support international cooperation against illicit brokering. 

Third, end-use and end-user control systems are one way in which states can cooperate during the pre-transfer stage to prevent and detect suspicious developments and potential risks of diversion facilitated by unscrupulous brokers. The former ATT WGETI sub-working group on Article 11 (on diversion) examined the issue of end-use and end-user documentation on several occasions. The exchanges determined that there is agreement among ATT states parties on the type of information to be included in end-use and end-user documentation. However, states parties have not yet been encouraged to exchange, via the ATT Secretariat, information and the national templates that they use. Doing so would further aid risk assessments to prevent or counter diversion of arms 

Fourth, the ATT Diversion Information Exchange Forum (DIEF) provides a unique platform for cooperation between states parties and signatories concerning concrete cases of diversion facilitated by suspected or detected illicit brokering activities and brokers. States parties are already encouraged to share specific cases and diversion-related information on illicit transfers, illicit armsbrokers, their methods of concealment and illicit routes. States parties may find the research consortium’s Diversion AnalysisFramework and counter-diversion tools useful for identifying key risk areas or defining red flags regarding brokers and brokering activities.

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