Jeremy Hunt urges Germany to rethink Saudi arms sales ban

Jeremy Hunt, the British foreign secretary, will visit Berlin on Wednesday after urging Germany to exempt big defence projects from its efforts to halt arms sales to Saudi Arabia, or face damage to both its economic and European credentials.

The surprise British lobbying came in a private letter sent to the German foreign minister, Heiko Maas.

Germany announced in November that it would provide no further arms export licences to Saudi Arabia over the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. It has not formally banned previously approved deals but has urged industry to refrain from such shipments for now.

The UK has fiercely criticised the killing of Khashoggi, but has refused to ban arms sales. A Lords committee at the weekend said it believed the UK was narrowly on the wrong side of humanitarian law by selling arms to Saudi Arabia for use in the civil war in Yemen.

Der Spiegel reported Hunt writing to Maas to say: “I am very concerned about the impact of the German government’s decision on the British and European defence industry and the consequences for Europe’s ability to fulfil its Nato commitments.”

In his letter Hunt – who is in Germany to discuss the terms of Brexit – said British defence firms would not be able to fulfil several contracts with Riyadh, including the Eurofighter Typhoon and the Tornado fighter jet, both of which are made with parts affected by the German halt in deliveries to Saudi Arabia.

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, at the recent Munich Security Conference appeared to acknowledge the force of Hunt’s argument, supported by the European defence industry, by saying Germany and France needed to coordinate their arms sales export policies more closely if European defence integration is to function.

Merkel, in a question-and-answer session after her speech, said: “We have because of our history very good reasons to have very strict arms export guidelines, but we have just as good reasons in our defence community to stand together in a joint defence policy. And if we want … to develop joint fighter planes, joint tanks, then there’s no other way but to move step-by-step towards common export controls guidelines.”

Hunt’s letter has been welcomed by the German defence industry. Hans Christoph Atzpodien, the head of Germany’s defence industry association, BDSV, said “the letter shows how Germany’s arms export practices are costing it the ability to partner with its closest European allies”.

In his letter, according to Der Spiegel. Hunt also wrote that the German government’s decision to halt arms exports to Saudi Arabia would cost German defence firms €2.3bn (£2bn) in revenues by 2026.

The German arms export ban is also holding up shipments of Meteor air-to-air missiles to Saudi Arabia by MBDA, which is jointly owned by Airbus, BAE Systems and Italy’s Leonardo, since the missiles’ propulsion system and warheads are built in Germany.

Germany is less dependent on arms sales to Saudi than France and the UK. Germany accounts for just under 2% of total Saudi arms imports, but supplies components for UK’s multimillion export contracts to Saudi, including for the proposed Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jets.

At the Munich conference Tom Enders, the German head of Airbus, warned the company may have to reorganise its operations as a result of political shifts on the issue, saying political interference was sending business “crazy”.

Enders added: “This is escalating very much at the moment. It just so happens that the Germans think that only they have a responsible arms export policy.”

The French company Naval Group and Saudi Arabia’s state-owned arms company Sami, which is headed by a German, also signed a joint statement of intent on Sunday, agreeing to build frigates and submarines together.

Hunt said the key to the settlement of the Brexit dispute was to be able to get a change to the backstop on Northern Ireland border that was sufficiently substantial for the British attorney general to be able to change his legal advice to parliament.