Johnathan Paoli
President Cyril Ramaphosa released the executive summary of the findings of an investigative panel into claims that South Africa supplied arms to Russia on Tuesday.
The summary confirmed that a Russian registered cargo ship known as the Lady R docked at Simonstown between 6 and 9 December 2022, which resulted in a public controversy, with several allegations and various demands upon the government.
In light of this, and in the interests of public interest, the President appointed an independent panel of three members to conduct the investigation; relying heavily upon letters by the President, interviewing 47 people, receiving 23 written submissions and containing over 100 documents.
The summary said that a number of other entities and persons that had publicly claimed to have information on this matter, after being invited to make submissions to the panel, either failed to do so or provided no independent knowledge of the relevant facts.
The summary said that South African authorities, Armscor and AB Logistics only discovered the sanctioned status of the Lady R in mid-October 2022 when the ship was already on its way. However, pointed out that the sanctions originate from the US and had not been endorsed by the United Nations and were therefore not binding on South Africa.
The shipping agents at Ngqura, where the ship was at first intended to dock, were unwilling and refused to service the ship as a result of the sanctions, subsequently the ship was redirected to Simonstown.
The summary said that the panel established that the goods delivered by the Lady R in Simonstown were equipment for the SANDF, which it had requested via Armscor in 2018 from a company based in the United Arab Emirates.
As part of the standard practice in relation to this kind of equipment, specifically in relation to its intended use, the goods were offloaded under cover of darkness during the nights of 7/8 and 8/9 December 2022.
The report maintained that despite the classified nature of the information, the Panel accepted the reasons provided for the decision to offload the equipment at night.
Despite rumours to the contrary, the report said that no evidence had been found to substantiate the claims that arms were loaded onto the ship, with available evidence only confirming the offloading.
The Panel further found that due the equipment not being properly containerised, only packed on pallets. Subsequently containers were brought to the port by trucks and the pallets loaded into the containers after which the containers were loaded back onto the trucks.
Due to running out of time on the early morning of 8 December 2022, remaining pallets on the quay were returned to the ship to resume offloading on nightfall of that day, due to security risks.
The panel was informed that due to the urgent circumstances surrounding the docking at Simonstown and potential tracking of the vessel by foreign intelligence agencies, the vessel switched off its Automatic Identification System (AIS) transponder.
However, the panel confirmed that the vessel contravened a number of provisions that relate to commercial vessels docking at South African ports, including a SARS designation of a port of entry, and consequently made recommendations in relation to the future management of foreign vessels docking at ports in the country.
The summary concluded with another set of recommendations in relation to the National Conventional Arms Control Committee (NCAA) concerning.
The US Embassy in Pretoria responded to the findings and said that it appreciated the serious approach adopted by the independent panel in considering the matter.
This followed public claims by the US ambassador, Reuben Brigety earlier this year that South Africa supplied Russia with arms.
In addition, the US Embassy Spokesperson David Feldman previously admitted that the US government shared some information regarding Lady R’s presence in South Africa to assist the investigating panel, although details of this information remain unknown.
The Embassy, speaking on behalf of the US, lauded President Ramaphosa for his commitment to investigate the matter, and pledged US cooperation in advancing progress on the two countries’ shared priorities.
It must be noted, however, the statement does not include a retraction from the Ambassador, nor does it apologize to the government and people of South Africa.
This follows on a potential straining of relations between the two countries after bipartisan lawmakers in June asked the White House to move the AGOA Forum due to be hosted in South Africa this November while also raising the possibility that the country would be excluded from the African Growth and Opportunity Act when it comes up for renewal in 2025.
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