The arms embargo and electronic equipment that the twenty-eight will adopt next Monday against Venezuela is going to affect very limited arms imports from the South American country. In the last five years, Russia and China have supplied more than 90% of the military material acquired by Caracas, the main importer of arms in Latin America. The Netherlands, Austria and Spain — which since 2014 vetoes the export of riot equipment — are the only three Community countries that have reached agreements for the sale of armaments to Venezuela in the last five years.
Venezuelan imports have plummeted over the past few years, as a matter of the collapse of their economy. Spending on arms purchases in 2016 was the least of the last decade, almost 500% less than in 2007. Russia, the world’s second largest arms exporter, has supplied more than 65% of the material that Venezuela has acquired in the last ten years. Since 2013 is Beijing who has become the preferred partner of Caracas, coinciding with the biggest credits that China began to grant to the government of Maduro. Ukraine has become its third exporter, although it does not add more than 3% of the total.
More information The EU gives the approval to adopt sanctions Against Venezuela Spain, which came to convert in 2012 to Venezuela in its main client of military material, suspended in a precautionary and Inde The licensing for the export of riot material after government repression in the massive protests of 2014 has been refined. Although that embargo remains in force, it is still being supplied to Caracas naval material. The volume of sales between the two countries has declined considerably in recent years: a little over 10 million euros in 2015 (cannons and a naval machine gun) and less than 3 million last year (spare parts for armoured, parts for a plane and software Radar simulation).
Holland and Austria are the other two EU countries that continue to export military material to Venezuela and will be affected by the embargo to be adopted on Monday in Brussels. In the last three years, Caracas has received six D-40 light aircraft from Austrian manufacturing and various Dutch radars. Italy and Germany have not delivered weapons to Venezuela from 2012 and 2014 respectively.
