MIAMI, United States. – The Spanish government refused to sell tear gas to Cuba for reasons of strict respect for human rights, the newspaper reported Thursday Publicwho had access to the report on operations of this type carried out in the first half of 2022 in Spain.
The document, sent by the Interministerial Board for Trade and Control of Defense Material and Dual-Use Technologies (JIMMDU), specifies that Spain denied the “export to Cuba of 2,500 tear gas and smoke cartridges and 40 light, sound and tear gas devices for a value of 350,000 euros destined for the Ministry of the Interior” of the Island.
The Spanish Government referred to criterion two of the Common Position of the European Union (EU), which serves as a code of conduct for the member countries of the community bloc.
This criterion refers to “respect for human rights in the country of final destination” of the arms export, as well as “respect for international humanitarian law by said country.”
Despite the refusal, the Government of Spain has previously sold riot control materials to the Cuban regime.
At the end of 2021, transcended that the Spanish Government had authorized the export of riot control material to Cuba for 350,000 euros in the first half of 2021, according to data collected in the report on Spanish Exports of defense material, presented to Congress by the Secretary of State for Trade .
As reported by the newspaper The country, The document did not specify “whether the export of police equipment (authorized before July 11) was consummated later or it was decided to suspend delivery due to the risk that it would be used to suppress peaceful demonstrations.”
In 2020, Spain exported military material to Cuba for a total of 1,202,500 euros, a figure that represented double the 612,300 euros allocated by the Cuban regime for the purchase of Spanish weapons in 2019, according to reports public offices of the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism of the European nation.
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