Corruption

TRANSPARENCY INTERNATIONAL: MIDEAST AND NORTH AFRICAN MILITARY CORRUPTION “CRITICAL”

WESTERN NATIONS, primarily the U.S., Great Britain, Germany, and Russia, have helped increase corruption among Middle Eastern and North African states by selling them vast quantities of weapons with little oversight, according to a new report by Transparency International. The resultant corruption, the report says, has worsened the region’s many conflicts, weakened military coherency, boosted extremism, and “formed a narrative for violent extremist groups.”

Many of the 17 countries listed in the report are already notoriously corrupt, and increasing military spending without adequate oversight, the report states, means defense budgets are not being spent to meet countries’ strategic needs, weapons are increasingly trafficked over porous borders and the governments’ domestic legitimacy — already battered by 2011’s revolts — are further undermined.