Defence`s Feeds

Russian Malyutka Anti-Tank Guided Missile

The objective of this hearing, on 30 June from 9.00-11.00, is to assess whether the use of drones complies with international law including respect for human rights and international humanitarian law. Issues related to civilian casualties and impact on affected communities, the question of transparency and accountability as well as the need for meaningful compensation mechanisms will also be addressed.
Location : PHS 4B001, BRUSSELS
Programme
Source : © European Union, 2016 - EP

will take place on Thursday 30 June, 9:00-11:00 (room Paul-Henri Spaak 4B001) and 11:15-12:45 (room Altiero Spinelli 5E-2) in Brussels.

Organisations or interest groups who wish to apply for access to the European Parliament will find the relevant information below.

Further information
watch the meeting live
Access rights for interest group representatives
Source : © European Union, 2016 - EP

On 21 June, EDA top management and experts met for the first time with the newly selected SME Senior Advisers, Mr Francisco González Mené and Mr Dušan Švarc. The advisers’ role is to counsel the Agency regarding future activities and identify new potential ideas and concrete initiatives in support of the defence-related SMEs.

Following a call for expression of interest for two SME Senior Advisers, 10 Member States proposed 15 candidates with impressive professional track record. Mr Francisco González Mené and Mr Dušan Švarc have been selected. Their mandate, based on EDA rules for external experts, will include the assessment of ongoing EDA initiatives and the provision of strategic advice and support on policies and actions regarding defence-related SMEs.

 

More information:

• CV of Mr Francisco González Mené
• CV of Mr Dušan Švarc

The US Navy has received its first air-to-ground network-enabled joint standoff weapon (JSOW C-1) after it achieved initial operational capability (IOC).

The UK Royal Navy's Daring-class air-defence destroyer HMS Diamond has successfully completed six weeks of operational sea training off the coast of Plymouth, UK.

The Royal Australian Navy's (RAN) second Canberra-class landing helicopter dock (LHD) ship HMAS Adelaide has participated in the tri-service exercise, Sea Explorer, off the North Queensland coast.

This report outlines the potential for a more structured and strategic relationship between the European Union and the Islamic Republic of Iran following the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). To both address areas of disagreement and complaints, as well as pursue common interests and matters of mutual benefit, the EU needs to put in place an institutional framework that can withstand the various setbacks that have, to date, derailed all previous efforts of political dialogue. There are a number of areas where both actors can benefit from cooperation; trade, environmental and sustainability issues, education, and combatting drug trade. Even when pursuing more contentious issues such as human rights, having a strategic and fully-fledged multilevel relationship will be helpful. There are also a number of political crisis in the region (ISIS, migration) where reaching a solution without Iranian involvement will either be unnecessarily costly or near impossible.
Source : © European Union, 2016 - EP

Russian SR-3 Vikhr Compact Assault Rifle

German Heckler and Koch MP5SD Silenced Submachine Gun

Military Life

Russian Bizon Submachine Gun

Russian AK-107 Assault Rifle

The European Defence Agency has recently published a web platform with information on opportunities of the EU COSME Programme for dual-use or defence-related SMEs.

COSME is the EU programme for the Competitiveness of Enterprises and SMEs, running from 2014 to 2020, with a budget of € 2.3billion. COSME aims at supporting SMEs in the following areas: facilitating access to finance; supporting internationalisation and access to markets; creating an environment favourable to competitiveness; and encouraging an entrepreneurial culture.

The programmes provides SMEs with access to:

• finance, i.e. long-term loans (backed by EU guarantees) and risk-capital/equity investments;
• a wide range of free-of-charge services.

Among other things, EDA’s COSME platform provides dual-use and defence-related SMEs with a dynamic and user-friendly mapping to identify their closest COSME’s financial intermediary (e.g., banks, equity fund) and their local free-service point of contact, in native language (from the Enterprise Europe Network - EEN).

COSME also provides grants for cross-border cluster partnerships. EDA’s platform highlights defence-related clusters, potentially eligible to access COSME grants, to partner with in order to apply for above funding opportunity.

 

More information:

• The EDA COSME platform is available at www.eda.europa.eu/cosme.

American AGM-86B ALCM Air-Launched Cruise Missile

Maritime forces from 17 nations and Nato have successfully concluded the 44th iteration of annual multinational naval exercise, Baltops 2016, in the Baltic Sea.

MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates (MDA) has been contracted by the Government of Canada to deliver an advanced broad-area global maritime and Arctic surveillance solution, Polar Epsilon 2 (PE2), to the Department of National Defence (DND).

Keeping secrets seems to be hardwired into human DNA; the use of cryptography – literally ‘hidden writing’ – as a means of secure communication arguably dates back nearly 4,000 years to late eleventh dynasty Egypt, and it has been in widespread use i…

The US Navy has deployed a new AN/SPY-6 radar at the Advanced Radar Development Evaluation Laboratory (ARDEL) at the Pacific Missile Range Facility (PMRF), following completion of Near Field Range testing last month.

The decentralised and democratic nature of the Western alliance has provided Russia with an opportunity to claim the informational advantage with regard to its information wars in Crimea and Syria, highlighting the urgency with which institutional transformations must be embraced.

The post Russia’s information wars in Syria and Ukraine appeared first on European Geostrategy.