LONDON – A report released by SIRPI has said that the Pakistan’s armsimports went down by 36 per cent between 2008–12 and 2013–17. The studysaid, “Pakistan accounted for 2.8 per cent of global arms imports in2013–17.
Its arms imports from the USA dropped by 76 per cent in 2013–17 comparedwith 2008–12 depicting that Pakistan is ending its reliance on US weaponssystems.
According to Siemon Wezeman, a senior researcher with the SIPRI Arms andMilitary Expenditure Programme, the tension in recent past with bothPakistan and China have led to the increase in growing demands of weapon,which India does not produce itself.
The study further said that China has increasingly been becoming capable ofproducing its own weapons, and maintaining itself as a supplier in theregion by maintaining good relations with Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar.
The US emerged as the world’s top exporter of weapons accounting for 34 percent of global arms sales in the last five years, according to the study.Russia accounted for 20 per cent of the export ranking second in the list.The US share of arms sales has gone up from 30 per cent recorded in the2008-12 period.