Advances of Forensic Remote Sensing Applications in the Face of Transnational Organized Crime and Terrorism

This chapter aims to investigate advance and relevance of remote sensing in detecting the increasing transnational terrorist and crimes acts. This work should take into the widest definition of transnational crimes and terrorist activities and the link between. Geopolitics has created a favor climate for the setting of transnational crimes and terrorism at the Tunisian-Libyan borders. A possible future scenario is the fall of a military base with high technology arms in the hand of terrorist groups. Remote would be relevant by monitoring of terrorist mobility and their number evolution, arms quality and quantity within the base and the region, linked illegal activities funding terrorist groups (human trafficking from Africa to Europe, arms trade towards Mali, and smuggling).

An Instrumental Connection. Economic Diplomacy, International Arms Trade and Overseas Aspirations between Portugal and Sweden, 1640–80

This paper offers an Iberian perspective on Sweden’s ‘Age of Greatness’ by looking at the intersection of international politics and trade involving Portugal and Sweden after Portugal regained its independence from Spain at the end of 1640. Sweden’s exports of timber, naval stores, iron, copper, and weapons to Braganza Portugal are seen in the context of the Portuguese wars for overseas trade and colonial settlement against the Dutch Republic and the struggle for autonomy against Spain in its home turf. By revisiting the accounts of diplomatic actors, this contribution will discuss how Portugal turned to Sweden for diplomatic recognition and new consumption markets and carriers for its export sector. It will also be shown how Sweden stood to gain by adding a new customer to its military export sector and by tapping into Portugal’s colonial goods and salt, while at the same time it entertained the prospect of using the Portuguese offshoots in West Africa and the East Indies to further its ambitions in overseas trade.

The Arms Trade Treaty

On 2 April 2013, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Arms Trade Treaty and on 24 December 2014, it entered into force. This marked the end of a long road towards achieving the first global treaty regulating the international trade in conventional arms and preventing their illicit trade and diversion. <br><br>This book offers readers a concise and workable insight into each of the Articles of this important legal instrument, as well as its negotiation and scope of application. It brings together renowned state practitioners, legal academics and non-governmental expert analysts with different perspectives and backgrounds, many of whom were directly involved in the negotiation of the Treaty itself. <br><br><i>The Arms Trade Treaty</i> will provide a comprehensive commentary to guide academics, officials, diplomats and others in the implementation of the Treaty. <br><br>This book was previously published by Larcier. By popular demand, it has been republished and is now available in eBook format.

APPROACH TO THE FORMALIZATION OF THE PROCESS OF CONDUCTING SPECIAL ACTIONS BY A SPECIAL FORCES UNIT USING THE ANALYTICAL-STOCHASTIC MODEL.

The current realities of the military-political situation in the world comprise the emergence of a significant number of new contradictions of various natures between states and entire regions, and in some countries acute territorial, religious and ethnic confrontations that have led to a number of armed conflicts. In addition, international terrorism, drug smuggling, illegal arms trade and organized crime pose serious threats today. The emergence of these threats brings the necessity of drastic changes in approaches to resolving them. A significant share in the settlement of these conflicts belongs to the Special Operations Forces, which is the youngest and most advanced component of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The authors identify one of the main problems that is the lack of a unified approach to the formalization of the process of conducting special actions. The purpose of this article is to form a mathematical model of the process of conducting special actions by the unit of Special Operations Forces during the planning and conducting of special operation. The authors propose an approach to the formalization of the process of conducting special actions by a special forces unit, using an analytical- stochastic model.

La industria de defensa en el mundo: hechos estilizados y tendencias

As in other areas, technological transformations, along with their high speed, have been incorporated into weapons systems throughout the global defense industry. However, it is not possible to know to what extent the new technological leaderships are undermining the foundations of those that existed until now. Along with this, changes in the geo-political and geo-economics spheres are generating a reality in which aspects such as the international arms trade, the emergence of SMEs in the sector or, as far as the EU is concerned, the promotion of defense policy, transform the morphology and relationships between the agents that intervene in this market. What can be the future trends considering the main stylized facts that are observed today?

Rethinking Security: An Analytical Study to Explore the Correlation Between Military Expenditure and Human Security in Arms Importing (Developing) States

ABSTRACT The following research seeks to identify a correlation between increasing military expenditure and the simultaneous changes observed in the levels of human security in arms importing states under the world military order. Identification of such trends is needed because leaders use the narrow understanding of security in terms of military strength to justify the higher global military expenditure. However, it is also understood that growing military expenditure increases insecurity amongst states. This paradox excludes consideration of other factors that impact human lives and need to be secured. The research uses case studies analyzed with quantitative data and analysis to determine any correlation between the two variables - military expenditure and human security. It is found that in arms importing states, there is generally an inverse proportionality, causing a negative correlation between military expenditure and human security. Therefore, higher military expenditure causes a drop in human security in importing states due to various structural factors of the global arms hierarchy. This illustrates a need to rethink the understanding of security to include other factors of human security: economic, political, personal, community, health, food, and environmental security for a holistic security approach to human lives in contemporary security studies. KEYWORDS: arms control, security studies, military expenditure, international order, global arms trade, human security, humanitarianism, neo-imperialism, militarism, world military order

TRADITIONAL WEAPONS ART OF DAGESTAN: ON THE EXAMPLE OF THE MASTER R. G. AKHMEDOV’S WORKS

The article attempts to highlight the traditional art of arms in Dagestan. A generalizing analysis of the arms trade is given; on the example of the author's works of the master of cold weapons Ramazan Akhmedov, the degree of influence of the author's works on the further development of modern arms art in Dagestan as a whole (for the period of the late XX – early XXI centuries) is determined. The innovative technologies and the characteristic ornamental style of compositions of the author's edged weapons are described.

The Reshaping Oil and Arms Trade between the United States and GCC: Is the Theory of Complex Interdependence Still Prevailing?

This paper makes use of interdependence theory to analyse the historical development of the economic relations between the GCC countries and the United States. The focus will be on oil and arms trade between the GCC countries and the United States. The results show that while the military and security dependence of the GCC countries on the United States remains relatively intact, the dependence of the United States on the natural resources of the GCC region has decreased. In light of this, the paper suggests that the historical interdependence between the GCC countries and the United States has recently evolved into a unilateral dependence and that the GCC countries’ natural resources are directed towards Asian countries.

The Emergence of the Arms Trade Treaty as a Global Norm Cluster

<p>The Arms Trade Treaty brings together a number of small arms control norms into one instrument and is a new initiative, which was instigated by state and NGO norm entrepreneurs. This thesis attempts to understand what has led to the emergence of these norms in the Arms Trade Treaty, in what will be termed a ‘cluster’ of small arms norms. Examining the small arms norms associated with the Arms Trade Treaty will explain their development and their likelihood of successfully being incorporated into this instrument. Analysis of the development of the norms related to the Arms Trade Treaty will explore the relationship between norms, their promoters and their opponents. This thesis will do this by providing detailed analysis of the development of specific norms in a series of case studies: control over arms brokering, transfers to non-state actors and civilian possession. It will place this development within the broader context of the ATT instrument and the international society in which it is emerging into. This thesis finds that power and powerful states have a significant role to play in the emergence of norms, in some cases despite the efforts of norm promoters. Norms were not able to emerge in their original form due to the influence of powerful states, which resulted in norms evolving in different directions or not emerging at all.</p>