74. On January 24, 1997 GE was identified as the world's biggest company, heading the Financial Times Global 500 list. GE was also named the most profitable U.S. company, with after-tax profits of $7.28 billion, as sales grew 13% to $79 billion. Financial Times, January 24, 1997, p. 17. GE has an estimated 250,000 employees and is ranked number ninety-six out of the top one hundred U.S. defense contractors. Aviation Week and Space Technology, vol. 146, no. 2, January 13, 1997, p. 235.
75. Letter from George R. Schneiter, Director, Strategic and Tactical Systems, Acquisition and Technology, Office of the Undersecretary of Defense, to Rep. Lane Evans, November 21, 1994. See Table 3 of the letter. It does not, however, specify whether GE supplied parts for antipersonnel or antitank mines, or both.
76. Letter from George R. Schneiter, Director, Strategic and Tactical Systems, Acquisition and Technology, Office of the Undersecretary of Defense, to Senator Patrick H. Leahy, February 10, 1997.
77. Eagle Eye Publishing, 1996.
78. In a letter to Human Rights Watch dated December 2, 1996, V.A. Fontana, managing director of Tecnovar Italiana, wrote: "Regarding our raw material producers we can confirm that our main suppliers were General Electric Plastics (GEP) for plastic components using the LEXAN polycarbonate produced in the GEP factory in the Netherlands; General Electric Plastics (U.S.) and Rhone-Poulenc (France) for the rubber components; Sandvik (Sweden) for stainless steel wire used in springs; RIV/SKF (Italy) for the stainless steel spheres present in the working mechanism. All the suppliers were aware of our production...."
79. Letter from Human Rights Watch to Jack F. Welch, Jr., Chairman of the Board and CEO, General Electric Co., December 3, 1996.
80. Statement from General Electric Company's Manager of Corporate Communications, David C. Warshaw, to Human Rights Watch, December 11, 1996.
81. Letter from Andrew Cooper, Human Rights Watch Arms Project Research Assistant, to David Warshaw, General Electric Company's Manager of Corporate Communications, December 12, 1996.
82. Letter from David Warshaw, General Electric Company's Manager of Corporate Communications, to Andrew Cooper, Human Rights Watch Arms Project Research Assistant, January 16, 1997.
83. Telephone interview with David Warshaw, General Electric Company's Manager of Corporate Communications, January 6, 1997.
84. Human Rights Watch Arms Project, "Arming Rwanda: The Arms Trade and Human Rights Abuses in the Rwandan War," A Human Rights Watch Short Report, vol. 6, issue 1, January 1994, p. 15. Appendix A3 contains a copy of a March 1992 $6 million dollar arms sale from Egypt to Rwanda, which included 2,000 MAT-79 antipersonnel mines, at a cost of $20 each.
85. United Nations, Third Report of the International Commission of Inquiry (Rwanda), October 28, 1996, p. 17: "On 17 September 1996, a member of the Commission visited Kibuye on the Rwandan side of Lake Kivu, where he inspected weapons seized from insurgents who had infiltrated into Rwanda. The weapons included TS-50 antipersonnel landmines which, the Commissioner was informed, were manufactured in southern Italy and which had not been available to the former RGF before the imposition of the embargo. Accordingly, the Commission wrote to the Government of Italy on 26 September to request information regarding the factory where the mines were said to have been manufactured, the countries to which they were delivered, delivery dates, the parties involved in the transactions and details of the end-user certificates and payment details. No reply has yet been received." No document number is available for this report because the United Nations has yet to release it for public dissemination.
General Electric's involvement in the landmines business first came to Human Rights Watch's attention when GE showed up on a 1994 Pentagon list of suppliers of landmines and mine components.75 DoD confirmed GE's past production activities in a February 10, 1997 letter stating that GE was a supplier of "integrated circuit components for the self-destructing landmines," and that GE is still considered by DoD to be one of several "potential sources of supply" for landmine components.76 Our review of the Eagle Eye Publishing database of defense contracts revealed that DoD awarded GE New Jersey landmine production contracts worth $667,000 from 1989 to 1992, though it is unclear whether the contracts were for antipersonnel or antitank mines, or for both.77
Subsequent research by Human Rights Watch has centered on GE's business ties with the Italian ex-landmine producer Tecnovar Italiana. In September 1996 a Human Rights Watch Arms Project researcher visited Tecnovar's facility in the southern Italian town of Bari and saw sacks of GE's Lexan plastic powder on the premises. Tecnovar subsequently wrote a letter to Human Rights Watch stating that GE's Dutch and U.S. subsidiaries supplied Lexan plastic powder and synthetic rubber components to Tecnovar sufficient to manufacture 1.6 million antipersonnel mines and 1.2 million antitank mines from 1979 to 1993.78 Human Rights Watch has also obtained invoices that identify GE as a supplier of Lexan to Tecnovar.
Human Rights Watch, in a December 3, 1996 letter to GE CEO Jack Welch, requested that the company issue a statement regarding any past or present involvement in the manufacture of antipersonnel landmines or their component parts.79 GE responded: "Based on a review of GE's business, we know of no active GE contracts or any current direct sales of GE products or materials in which we are involved with manufacturers of antipersonnel mines, mine components or mine delivery systems....The reported presence of our materials at a particular company cannot be construed as evidence of a current direct relationship with GE."80
While GE was forthcoming about its absence of "current direct" activities, it made no comment about past production and supply, nor would the company agree to renounce future production and supply. In a follow-up letter, Human Rights Watch again explicitly asked GE to comment on its past activities related to landmines. A Human Rights Watch researcher sought clarification on this point: "In my December 3 letter I also requested information about GE's possible past involvement in antipersonnel mine production. Your statement did not address the issue of past production. The Arms Project is committed to researching and identifying any company which has shown a previous capacity or willingness to be involved in mine production and component supply. Our primary concern is that these companies may involve themselves in future mine production....Human Rights Watch requests a statement by GE regarding possible past involvement in the manufacture or supply of antipersonnel mines, their component parts and the systems that dispense them."81
Five weeks later, GE responded in writing: "After consideration of our recent conversations and after further review by our businesses, there is no change in GE's statement contained in my December 11, 1996 letter to you....We know of no active GE contracts nor any current direct sales of GE products or materials in which we are involved with manufacturers of antipersonnel mines, mine components or mine delivery systems....GE's name on an undated (but apparently old) government list of suppliers is not relevant to the Company's current operation."82 On January 17, 1997, the day after receiving GE's reply, Human Rights Watch sent yet another letter inquiring about past activities, but has not received a response.
GE's refusal to address directly the issue of past involvement in antipersonnel mine production, the fact that it has not denied past involvement, and its dismissal of "old" Pentagon documentation are indicative of an effort to avoid the embarassment of its evident status as a past supplier of antipersonnel mine components. Indeed, one company representative has expressed concern about GE being held responsible for what he described as "historical" events.83 Human Rights Watch strongly urges GE to answer our concerns and to take steps to stop the use of its products in antipersonnel mine production in the U.S. and overseas.
It is instructive to note where some of the Italian mines ended up. Tecnovar in 1979 beat out half a dozen other big European companies to stock Egypt's landmine arsenal. From 1979 to 1993 Tecnovar delivered a total of 1.4 million TS-50 antipersonnel mines and 200,000 VAR-40 antipersonnel mines to Egypt. In the Egyptian Army's arsenal the TS-50 was renamed "Mine Type 79" and exported under the acronym "MAT-79."
In 1994 Human Rights Watch published documents linking Egypt to weapons flooding Rwanda in the months prior to the genocide. MAT-79 Egyptian antipersonnel landmines were cited in one document.84 In 1996, after being alerted to arms smuggling along the Zaire-Rwanda border, a United Nations commission initiated an investigation of Tecnovar after recording the presence of antipersonnel mines among weapons captured from rebel Hutu militia groups.85
