NON-GOVERNMENTAL REGISTER 
OF CONVENTIONAL ARMS EXPORTS FROM THE CIS 

Launched in 1996, this information-oriented project of the PIR Center aims to summarize and systematize information about Russia's military-technical cooperation and the export of arms and materials. The project seeks to do the same for other CIS states, especially for the Ukraine, Byelorussia, and Kazakhstan.

The project is based on a number of public sources. As a result, the Register includes both officially confirmed arms supply data and unofficial information about material shipments. Data pertaining to gray export is also collected and processed.

The first stage of the project, conducted from 1996 to 1997, began with collaboration between the PIR Center and the International Institute for Policy Studies in Minsk, Byelorussia. More recently, the PIR Center established project relations with the Center for International Trade and Security, University of Georgia (USA). The project relationship between these two organizations is focused on Russian military-technical cooperation with India and China. Currently, the PIR Center runs the project on its own.

The project included the seminar "Prospects of Conventional Arms Export from Russia" (November 1997) and the publication of the journal Conventional Arms Export (1996-1997).

The Register has been kept since 1996 and is published annually in January-February. It sums up the previous year's development and, while it serves as a valuable source of unofficial information, it has no intention of being a substitute for the United Nations Register. The PIR Center expands this project to include two other registers: a non-governmental register of arms sales from Ukraine, and a non-governmental register of arms sales from Byelorussia.

In 2000 and 2001 several PIR publications included information on this subject, especially the bulletin “Russian Security”:

• Conventional Arms Export from Belarus (vol. 4, no. 3 (69), February 16, 2000)
• The Export of Arms and Military Equipment from Russia and the CIS to Sub-Saharan Africa (vol. 4, no. 4 (70), February 25, 2000)
• Arms Trade in Africa South of the Sahara (vol. 4, no. 5 (71), March 15, 2000)
• The Prospects of Gray and Black Arms Market in Africa. (vol. 4, no. 6 (72), March 23, 2000)
• Russia and Syria: Military-Technical Bargaining. (vol. 4, no. 7 (73), April 6, 2000)
• Russia-Iran: A New Start of Military-Technical Cooperation (Vol. 5, No. 5 (95), March 6, 2001)
• Russia’s Military-Technical Cooperation with the States of Concern (Vol. 5, No. 18(108), September 15, 2001).

On December 6-7, 2001 the PIR Center in collaboration with Saferworld (UK) plans to hold an international conference “National and International Norms, Principles And Measures for Controlling Small Arms Proliferation: The View from Russia”.

For more information contact Project Director Vadim Kozyulin by Phone (095) 234-0525; Fax (095) 234-9558 or at kozyulin@cityline.ru