Germany to resume arms exports to Saudi Arabia banned since 2018 Khashoggi killing

According to a government spokesman on Wednesday, Germany has authorized the transfer of 150 IRIS-T air-to-air missiles to Saudi Arabia, restarting military sales to the country that have been prohibited since the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. A security official told the media that the agreement was approved by Germany’s federal security council in December, confirming a Spiegel news magazine article. Saudi Arabia’s Eurofighter planes fire the German arms manufacturer Diehl’s IRIS-T missiles. The official added that the missiles have recently been used to shoot down drones fired from Houthi-controlled Yemen. The current batch, which has not yet been delivered, is intended to restore Saudi inventories that have been depleted during the previous years. Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock announced this week that Berlin would no longer obstruct British plans to sell Riyadh more Eurofighters, marking a significant change in stance. The British, German, Italian, and Spanish governments collaborated on the Eurofighter project. In December, Baerbock expressed his strong condemnation of attacks by Houthi-controlled Yemen on merchant ships in the Red Sea and expressed gratitude to Riyadh for its assistance in thwarting similar attacks by bringing down drones and missiles. Following the murder of Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018, Germany banned the export of weapons to the country. (With agency inputs)