69 Patriot missiles seized en route to China

[Gnomad]

This was on Cryptogon:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/eur ... story.html

A shipment of 69 surface-to-air missiles impounded by Finnish authorities was a legitimate delivery from Germany to South Korea, a German official said Thursday.

The announcement came after Finnish authorities seized the Patriot missiles and 160 tons of explosives on a British-registered cargo ship and detained two Ukrainian crew members on suspicion of violating weapons export laws.

Police said the missiles didn’t have the right transit documents and the explosive picric acid wasn’t properly stored on the M/S Thor Liberty, which docked in Kotka, southern Finland, on Dec. 15.

A spokesman for Germany’s Defense Ministry said the missiles were an official shipment that was fully declared and had all necessary clearings from German authorities.

“Those patriot guided missiles are from the Bundeswehr’s stocks and have been shipped to South Korea” according to an intergovernmental treaty, he said, declining to be named in line with government policy.
He said no explosives were part of the shipment and he didn’t have any information on that part of the impounded cargo.

Finnish officials said the explosives were destined for China. Markku Koskinen, the director of traffic operations at the port of Kotka, said they were deficiently packed in wooden boxes on open pallets and would be moved to metal containers in line with rules on the maritime transport of explosives.

“We will do that as soon as the customs inspectors allow us to,” Koskinen told The Associated Press. “Otherwise, the shipment of explosives was legitimate and can continue on its way to China as soon as it’s safely packed.”

The ship sailed from the north German port of Emden on Dec. 13 and was en route to China, Finnish officials said. It docked in Kotka to pick up a cargo of anchor chains and an old paper machine.

Finnish officials impounded the cargo Wednesday and launched an investigation. Detective Superintendent Timo Virtanen said the ship’s captain and first mate were detained.

“The missiles did not have the appropriate transit papers,” Virtanen said. “We are questioning all the other 11 crew members who are also Ukrainians.”
Klaus Kaartinen, spokesman for the National Bureau of Investigation, said Finnish police and customs would continue their investigation into the cargo.
“Even if the missile cargo is a legitimate shipment, from a Finnish point of view the law has probably been broken because it was not properly declared,” Kaartinen said. “Also, the explosives were stored improperly.”

[Infernal Optimist]

Why not an even 70?

They wanted to try the merchandise before buying. So they shot one of them off.

[Dradin Kastell]

And the story develops: now, apparently, the spin is in and the German and South Korean media are finally on message. They are doing their best to paint this as a Finnish mistake, focusing on differing national regulations about the transport of explosives and the confusion about translating the word "rocket" on the cargo manifest. The Spiegel, for example, calls this a "farce for the Finnish government".

What is downplayed is that for the Finnish government, this is obviously an illegal arms shipment and that the shipping company seems to be absurdly oblivious about the cargo they are carrying without appropriate permits.

Link to the Spiegel piece (in German): http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,805555,00.html

I hope the Finnish authorities keep their heads cool and stick to their rights, even though I suspect they might chicken out and allow the Germans and South Koreans get their way too easily.

[Ben D]

So they're American made missiles, belonging to the Germans, sent on a British registered ship, with a Ukrainian crew, discovered in Finland, whose officials said they were bound for China, but are now discovered to be bound for Sth Korea...

Helsinki green-lights Patriot missile shipment to SKorea

AFP – 2 hrs 55 mins ago

Sixty-nine Patriot missiles impounded in Finland after being found on a merchant vessel in mid-December were headed for South Korea, the Finnish government said Wednesday, granting their transit through Finnish territory.

"The missiles in question had been sold to the Republic of Korea by Germany," the government said in a statement, adding that it had granted a licence to Seoul's "Defence Acquisition Programme Administration to transit through Finnish territory 69 Patriot missiles."

The surface-to-air missiles, produced by US firm Raytheon, were discovered on December 15 aboard the British-registered Thor Liberty docked in the southeastern Finnish port of Kotka.

Confusion initially surrounded the shipment.

Finnish police said the goods were bound for China but did not have the necessary authorisation to pass through Finland, while a German defence ministry spokesman said the missiles came from the German military and were destined for South Korea.

The spokesman said it was a "legal sale on the basis of an accord between two states at the government level" and that export authorisations were in order.

However a senior Finnish defence ministry official said Finland had not received any transit licence application for the missiles from Germany.

A joint team of Finnish customs and police officials removed and impounded the missiles during an investigation for suspected illegal export of defence material.

The vessel's Ukrainian captain and first mate were also detained for questioning and later slapped with a travel ban which is still in effect.

Last week the customs service said it planned to widen the investigation.

"Next week... we will want to hear more suspects or persons of interest in the case. It is possible there may be others of interest," the head of the Finnish customs anti-crime unit, Petri Lounatmaa, told AFP.

Finnish transport safety officials have cleared the Thor Liberty to leave Finland, but the vessel has remained in port due to the travel ban imposed on its first officers, and the removal of its cargo.