China’s Arms Sales to Sudan

In March 2008, Human Rights First’s report, Investing in Tragedy: China’s Money, Arms and Politics in Sudan, showed that from 2003 to 2006, China sold over $55 million worth of small arms to Khartoum. Since 2004, the year in which the United Nations Security Council imposed an embargo on arms transfers to Darfur, China has been the near-exclusive provider of small arms to Khartoum, supplying approximately 90 percent of Sudan’s small arms purchases each year.

Investing in Tragedy also showed how arms sales are just one facet of China’s wide-ranging support for Sudan. In fact, through its financial, military and political support of the Khartoum regime, China has helped to sustain the violence in Darfur. After more than five years of conflict that has left at least 200,000 people dead and more than 2.5 million people homeless, China has maintained its strong relationship with the government of Sudan despite the government’s record of mass atrocities in Darfur.

Report: Investing in Tragedy: China’s Money, Arms and Politics in Sudan

Fact sheet: China’s arms sales to Sudan

Video: China’s role in Sudan