The influence of UAE’s EDGE in Germany has probably ended before making space for itself. The German Defense Ministry recently cancelled millions of dollars’ project to provide assault rifles, which was awarded to CG Haenel, which comes under the Emirates’ EDGE Group.
A years of relationship of demanding and acquiring assault rifles from a defense manufacturing firm, Heckler & Koch, suddenly faced a turbulence, as the German Ministry of Defense decided to shift the contract. The Oberndorf am Neckar-based firm has been a major gun supplier of Bundeswehr from nearly 60 years, where had been supplying the G36 assault rifles since 1997. However, the association came to a test in 2017, when alleged problems surfaced around the accuracy of the rifles in high temperatures.
Three years after the Defense Ministry open a bidding for replacement, the military intentions of UAE’s EDGE in Germany made their way. Defeating the years-old supplier, a small weapon manufacturing company, CG Haenel won the bid to deliver an order of 120,000 new rifles worth $250 million. The firm based in Suhl received the order to deliver MK556 rifles, against the HK416 of Heckler & Koch, in mid-September 2020. The award was, however, lifted from CG Haenel within weeks.
Involvement of UAE’s Defense Network
A firm that defeated Heckler & Koch’s years of alliance, CG Haenel is owned by the United Arab Emirates, through a chain of firms. The parent company of CG Haenel, Merkel Group manufactures hunting weapons and is a subsidiary of UAE-based Caracal International. These three weapon manufacturers ultimately fall under the UAE’s defense and military conglomerate, EDGE Group.
The corrupt links are making way through UAE’s EDGE in Germany, whose founder Faisal Al Bannai also heads DarkMatter, a brainchild of MbZ’s son Khalid bin Mohammed al Nahyan that is involved in offensive cyber operations. It also assisted the intentions of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who ordered a hit-squad to murder The Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. DarkMatter helped Saudi’s Saud al Qahtani in acquiring hacking software Pegasus from Israel’s NSO Group to hack Khashoggi’s phone, before he was killed.
Abu Dhabi’s EDGE Group that owns CG Haenel, consolidated 25 independent entities, including the Tawazun Holding, when it was formed in November 2019. The owners of Tawazun, which operates in defense and security industry of UAE, also founded the International Golden Group (IGG). The weapon supplying firm, IGG, has a partnership with Tahnoun bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s Royal Group, and is known for providing illicit weapons to militia and terrorist groups in Yemen and Libyan civil war and to Al-Qaeda in Syria.
Interest of UAE’s EDGE in Germany
The contract offered to CG Haenel by the German Defense Ministry was lifted in early October 2020 due to patent infringement, following Hecker & Koch’s 320-page complaint to the procurement office. While winning of the contract was seen as a result of UAE’s years of efforts to acquire it, the cancellation was seen as avoiding the situation where millions of taxpayers’ money could have been lost.
The interests of UAE’s EDGE in Germany are aligned with the intentions of the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, MbZ, who has systematically worked for years to win such defense bid in the Berlin. It is likely that the Emirates lobbied to acquire such big contract from Bundeswehr through CG Haenel. The Arab nation has been seeking to build largest global arms firm for years, where the German Defense Ministry’s order was seen as a feasible way of marketing. The order, however, has now been lost.
While patent infringement issues were responsible for the gone contract, the human rights records of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) were also partly responsible. Anti-arms activist Jürgen Grässlin called the contract a “catastrophe from a human rights point-of-view” and the United Arab Emirates “a crisis zone”.
Besides, the capabilities of CG Haenel to cover the manufacturing cost of the assault rifles were being doubted, although it came under the wealthy owners of Abu Dhabi. Many raised concerns if part of the order would be manufactured in the UAE, citing the mere strength of CG Haenel’s 120 employees.
The German firm under UAE, CG Haenel had almost acquired the Bundeswehr contract, despite extensive loopholes and a history of the Emirates’ tainted network of companies. It was an attempt of UAE’s EDGE in Germany, as a part of the Arab nation’s plans of diversifying the economy beyond oil. However, in its efforts to gain personal benefits, the UAE has been disrupting the establishment of other nations, like it recently tried in Germany.
