Two companies were ejected last night from Britain's biggest arms fair for promoting leg irons for prisoners and battlefield captors.
BCB International, a British-based firm, and Famous Glory Holding, a Chinese company, were thrown out of the biennial Defense Systems and Equipment show, which opened in London's Docklands on Tuesday.
Although the type of leg irons on offer appear to escape the government's ban on the sale and export of equipment that can be used for repression and torture, their promotion is hugely embarrassing to the exhibition's organizers.
PHOTO: AP
The two companies were told to leave, allegedly for breach of contract, by Reed Elsevier, organizers of the fair.
BCB denied trying to sell leg irons.
Andrew Howell, its managing director, said the organizers had "misinterpreted" equipment in their catalogue, adding they were not advertising leg irons but "light extendable flexible" cuffs used to restrain hands.
Howell said a DVD promoting his firm's equipment, which contained a photograph of the cuff, was 10 years old.
He said ejection from the trade exhibition was "totally unfair" and that his firm had been questioned by customs officials on Tuesday.
A representative of Famous Glory Holding made no comment.
The UK government and Reed Elsevier have tried to improve the image of the arms exhibition. Arms companies this year were told not to show off cluster weapons which, while not illegal, are widely condemned because the unexploded "bomblets" they scatter over a wide area maim and kill civilians.
At least one company was told not to promote its cluster bombs at the fair despite its strong attempts to do so.
The UK government last year altered the rules to allow the export of leg irons, cuffs and shackles if their chains were between 240mm and 280mm long. However, the UK Foreign Office Web site lists a range of equipment that it says the government wants to control.
The list includes "stun guns and tasers and specially designed components for such devices, leg irons, gang chains, shackles (excluding normal handcuffs) and electric-shock belts designed for the restraint of a human being."
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS