Weaponry from East-European countries, including Romania, exported in Middle East countries

East-European countries, including Romania, approved weaponry sales of over EUR 1 billion, in the last four year, to Middle East countries that provide groups involved in the civil war from Syria with munition, says a report of BIRN and OCCRP organizations.

Thousands of AK-47 rifles, cannon shots, rocket launchers and artillery systems are exported from the East and South-Eastern Europe in Middle East countries that are neighbouring Syria.

There are rumours saying that most of the exported arms have as destination Syria, supporting the civil war started five years ago, says the report made by the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) and the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).

The data about the munition export, the ONU reports and the contracts prove that weaponry amounted at EUR 1.2 billion were exported from Romania, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Montenegro, Slovakia and Serbia, starting with 2012.

„The investigation made by BIRN and OCCRP shows that some arms reached groups of the Syrian opponents, but others are used to fight the Islamists, including the terrorist network Islamic State, ” says the release.

According to the investigations, Romania had exported weaponry valued at EUR 81 billion in the Middle East in the last four years.

The kind of arms exported are used by the Liberal Syrian Army, a group of the Syrian opposition supported by Western countries, but also by Islamist countries such as Ansar al-Sham, Al-Nusra Boarder and the terrorist organization Islamic State.

Since March 2011 Syria has been dealing with violent insurgences and military conflict between the security services subordinated to the Bashar al-Assad regime, the opponent forces and terrorist groups.

Georgiana Bendre