End-user certificate

An End-user certificate, or EUC, is a document used in international transfers, including sales and arms provided as aid, of weapons and ammunition to certify that the buyer is the final recipient of the materials, and is not planning on transferring the materials to another party. EUCs are required by many governments to restrict the flow of the materials to undesired destinations, such as embargoed states or rebel groups, governments with bad human rights records or states which are considered a threat by the original supplier of the arms. There are several problems with EUCs as a means to prevent undesirable arms exports. EUCs can be forged or falsified; they can also be obtained from corrupt officials. Therefore there is a need for EUCs that are difficult to forge. Another problem is that an EUC does not guarantee that the arms recipient will actually live up to its promise not to re-transfer the weapons received. EUCs which are not backed up by proper end-use monitoring are weak. Finally, arms dealers can resort to smuggling arms; for example by labeling them as or hiding them between commercial merchandise.

In 1936-1938, German arms were supplied to both sides in the Spanish Civil War via Greece using Greek then Mexican end-user certificates, see Pyrkal. In Frederick Forsyth's 1974 novel The Dogs of War arms are obtained with end-user certificates from corrupt officials.