According to a report published by the German Press Agency (DPA) on Tuesday, in the first half of 2016 Germany saw a tenfold increase in the sales of small-caliber gun ammunition, considered to be one of the major weapons causing civilian deaths in global and regional wars.
The report detailed that a lion’s share of the contracts, some €275 million, was made with Berlin’s traditional EU and NATO partners, as well as countries including Australia, New Zealand and Japan.
However, Germans have been actively trading with countries like Iraq, nailing €5.4 million worth of deals with the war-ravaged state.
According to German defense analyst Sebastian Schulte, the sales rise coincided with the intensification of fighting with Daesh in the Middle East.
"The coalition is at the gates of Mosul, they're going through a lot of ammunition, and Germany has decided to support the coalition — notably the Kurds," Schulte said to Deutsche Welle. "You can go through several barrels of ammo for a machine gun in a day. That is quite normal."
In 2014, the country’s economy minister vowed to limit the amount of ammunition exports. It was revealed, however, that in 2015, deals doubled over a one-year period, from €3.97 billion to €7.86 billion.
Following the Tuesday revelation, the government has come under heavy political criticism from the Lefts and the Green Party.
The total sum of contracts Germany has received to date in 2016 has reached an unprecedented €4 billion. Nations that have received German weapons and ammunition include states involved in current conflicts, such as Turkey, Saudi Arabia and South Korea.
Earlier, Germany was revealed to be one of the top five countries that benefit most from arms sales, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
