Stopping at Source

Conflict Armament Research (CAR) investigates how illicit armed actors access the materials required to produce and deploy improvised explosive devices (IEDs). In conflicts around the world, IEDs continue to pose a significant threat both to civilians and security forces. According to a June 2024 report of the United Nations (UN) Secretary-General, at least  3,237 people were killed and injured in 2023 by IEDs  in the UN’s 25 active mine action operations, most notably in Somalia, followed by Mali and Burkina Faso.

The versatility of this threat—and the varied means of access to materials needed to produce IEDs—continues to make these weapons particularly challenging to counter without coordinated responses.

Upstream measures—those focused on prevention—seek primarily to limit access to IED-related materials. These measures include  improving the regulation of IED components and precursors , strengthening border controls, and conducting intelligence-led counter-IED operations. Upstream measures are, by definition, taken before a threat manifests and develops; therefore, the more effectively that upstream measures are implemented, the less there is a need for reactive downstream responses, which range from ‘defeat the device’ to judicial proceedings.

CAR works to strengthen and inform upstream IED prevention. Its investigations generate evidence on the diversion of IED-related materials to support governments and industry in preventing illicit actors from obtaining IED components and precursors.

Since 2020, CAR has documented IED-related materials in ten conflict-affected countries, including Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Syria, and  Yemen , and has launched major investigations into how IED-related material fell into the hands of illicit actors in these countries. By detecting new trends in the acquisition of IED-related material, tracing these items, and mapping supply chains to uncover points of diversion and illicit procurement networks, CAR works to inform the most effective upstream measures that industry and governments can take to prevent illicit actors from producing and deploying IEDs.

This report is the second from CAR to focus specifically on the threat of IEDs. It follows CAR's 2023 report ‘ Upstream IED Prevention ’, which showed how field documentation and tracing works to inform effective policy responses to the IED challenge. This report focuses specifically on how illicit actors acquire materials that can be used to support IED production. It draws on CAR’s recent and ongoing field investigations, primarily in West Africa and in Iraq and Syria, to show how illicit actors obtain the materials and knowledge to produce IEDs and how the monitoring and tracing of recovered material can aid in preventing their further proliferation.

This report focuses on three ways in which illicit armed actors have sought to acquire and control access to IED-related material: 

●      management of  historic stockpiles ;

●      acquisition or  diversion of commercial explosives ; and

●      repurposing of  conventional ammunition .

This report was produced with the support of the Government of France. Research for the case studies used in this report has been conducted with the financial assistance of the European Union, the Government of Germany, and the European Union’s Internal Security Fund – Police.

Long-term field monitoring helps shed light on how illicit items circulates in conflict zones and how acquisition strategies may change over time.

For more than a decade, CAR investigators have been documenting equipment seized from Islamic State (IS) forces operating in Iraq and Syria, including materials used in the manufacture of IEDs.

The discovery of this older material in these recent seizures indicates that IS forces in north-east Syria are either unable or unwilling to access newer supplies and, instead, are relying on products stockpiled at the height of their territorial control.

CAR’s trace investigations confirmed that all the detonating cord recovered in 2022 from Islamic State cells had been part of the same historic shipments from 2012 to 2015.

Although CAR’s investigations show an apparent decline in the ability of IS forces in Iraq and Syria to acquire new precursors and components for IEDs, they also reveal the groups’ capacity to store, secure, and maintain material in their possession over a long period. By comparing the material documented in the three seizures from top-tier IS cells in north-east Syria, CAR was able to highlight how IS, despite losing territorial control, still has a coordinated and centralised acquisition, supply, and distribution system, including for IED-related material. 

This case highlights the critical importance of monitoring and tracing materials recovered in IED-related seizures. Valuable information exists on these items, both in the form of traceable markings and in the visible signatures of their production and distribution. This can help investigators pinpoint the acquisition pathways that are supporting non-state armed groups. In the case of IS forces in Iraq and Syria, CAR’s field monitoring and tracing has—over a protracted period—provided governments and industry with years of grounded, empirical data on exposed supply chains, informing their future risk assessments and helping to prevent the future diversion of IED-related materials.

CAR's field investigations show that Islamic State forces in north-east Syria are either unable or unwilling to access newer supplies and, instead, are relying on products stockpiled at the height of their territorial control.

The UN Secretary-General’s 2024 report on the IED threat spotlights the risk of commercial explosives— like explosive cartridges and detonating cord —being diverted to become a potential source for IED production.

Commercial explosives are widely used in civilian sectors like construction, mining, and quarrying. They can also be used in IEDs.

For example, CAR field teams in Iraq and Syria have documented multiple types of improvised weapons and IEDs that IS forces have developed using commercially available detonating cord to complete the explosive train between the detonator and the main charge.

In its investigations in Iraq, CAR has uncovered cases where commercial transfers of detonating cord were intercepted or diverted and the materials subsequently integrated into IS weapon production programmes.

More recent CAR investigations across West Africa have also identified considerable losses of commercial explosives in the regional mining sector. CAR investigators have documented, for example, more than 13,000 diverted explosive cartridges recovered in the region since 2016. This material had been acquired legally from well-established suppliers in Europe before being shipped to the destination country. Upon arrival, consignments are typically moved by road to the intended mining site. However, CAR has found that some of this material was diverted after its delivery, either during its road transportation or from local private storage facilities.

Importantly, CAR has seen little evidence that these materials, once diverted, are used in IED production in the region. Rather, they are  more likely to be used to fuel illicit mining activities . A very small proportion of diverted commercial explosives in West Africa has any association with IED production in the region. However, there is significant potential for commercial explosives in general to be used by criminals or terrorists, including to develop IEDs, and the diversion of this material therefore remains a threat to regional security.

For example, CAR investigators have traced diverted explosive cartridges that authorities in Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, and Mali seized between 2017 and 2020. These cartridges were all manufactured by one European company and legally exported to a single company serving the local mining sector in a country in the region.

In total, CAR has traced 14 different seizures of commercial explosives in these three countries back to the same mining company, three of which were confirmed to be linked to terrorist activities in the region. 

CAR’s tracing investigations for diverted commercial explosives in West Africa is building critical risk awareness among manufacturing companies, intermediaries, and national authorities in the region, including police, customs, and counter-terrorism units. In this case, after CAR’s investigations, the local mining company started working on a new management plan with the manufacturer to improve its explosive management system to prevent further cases of diversion.

Commercial explosives are readily available on physical and online markets, and the extent to which their transfers are controlled or licensed varies considerably between countries. This underscores the importance of effective supply chain security, including by enhancing due diligence efforts, to safeguard such material from diversion before, during, and after its transfer.

CAR has traced 14 different seizures of commercial explosives in West Africa to the same mining company, three of which were confirmed to be linked to terrorist activities in the region. 

Unsecured, abandoned, or cached ammunition is attractive to non-state armed actors who can use it with  relative ease to develop IEDs . Across its global operations, CAR has documented IEDs and improvised weapons that are based on medium- and large-calibre ammunition, such as hand grenades, mines, mortars, projectiles, and rockets.

This ammunition has previously been lost, stolen, or otherwise diverted from legal custodians.

In many conflict- and terrorism-affected countries, conventional ammunition like mortars and rockets may be more readily available to non-state armed actors—often a result of the challenges faced in protecting facilities and personnel from fast-evolving security threats.  CAR investigations in Mali between 2013 and 2016 , for example, demonstrated that the rockets and artillery used in projected-IED (P-IED) attacks in the country at that time had originated in national stockpiles.

By comparing the lot numbers of eighty 57 mm and 122 mm rockets used in P-IED attacks or otherwise recovered from weapon caches, CAR was able to either match markings with rockets in Malian state stockpiles or identify a close sequential correspondence.

Conventional ammunition can be diverted at many other points in its transfer or storage life cycle, not just from stockpiles. As such, States have recognised effectively securing ammunition and preventing its use in IED production as a priority area for collective action.

This priority was formally recognised in 2023 with the adoption of the  Global Framework for Through-life Conventional Ammunition Management  (GFA). Under the GFA, States commit —as one of 15 key objectives—to take steps to deny unauthorised recipients from accessing usable conventional ammunition and its energetic material.

This includes

• prioritising clearance of abandoned or unexploded ordnance;
• safeguarding the storage, recovery, and disposal of legacy stocks of ammunition;
• ensuring that surplus stocks are secured; and
• destroying obsolete and unserviceable conventional ammunition.

These measures are just one part of a comprehensive framework that seeks to ensure that poorly secured ammunition is not diverted or otherwise made available to criminals, insurgents, internationally recognised terrorists, or other unauthorised actors for use in IEDs.

The 2024 report of the UN Secretary-General highlights nine recommendations to address diversion risks for materials that can be used to manufacture IEDs. Many of these are upstream measures, including encouraging States to:

• conduct rigorous pre-transfer risk assessments (government authorities) and commercial due diligence exercises (private sector) for the export of sensitive commodities;

• monitor trade flows;

• promote comprehensive and accessible record-keeping; and

• support national investigations and industry-led audits of the diversion of IED-related material and engage in accurate tracing.

This emphasis recognises, as CAR’s investigations have also shown, that some of the most impactful measures are those that can be taken at the very earliest points in the life cycle of this material—before it is exported, before it diffuses across borders and through complex supply chains, and before it reaches the hands of illicit actors.

A different approach is required to tackle the threat associated with each of the acquisition pathways identified in this report. CAR’s long-term field monitoring and tracing in Iraq and north-east Syria have, for example, effectively unearthed key technical and material chokepoints that show how reliant non-state armed groups are on specific sources and expertise to develop IEDs. Maintaining and extending this scrutiny is the only way to devise and implement effective policy responses. Further extension of CAR’s investigative methodology into more conflict- and terrorism-affected contexts will ensure that CAR’s field operations continue to provide granular evidentiary insights into how illicit armed actors access materials that can be used to support IED production.

For such materials that are openly traded and that serve important commercial functions, much can be done to raise risk awareness among manufacturers, distributors, and other parties and to work in cooperation with them to identify ‘red flags’ that expose supply chains to potential diversion. The challenge of conventional ammunition being seized and repurposed for IEDs, meanwhile, is a complex one that requires enhanced security, not only in stockpiles but also during transfer. The 2023 GFA provides a vital platform to coordinate and address this challenge globally.  

The threat posed by IEDs is continually evolving. CAR first reported on the  aerial deployment of IEDs  from commercial quadcopter uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs), for example, as early as 2016, but this phenomenon is rapidly becoming more widespread as UAV capabilities grow more accessible to a wider range of actors. The issue of UAV weaponisation, including with IEDs, is something that CAR will continue to monitor and report on as it encounters new developments in the field. Seen through a prevention lens, the constantly shifting nature of IED deployment further emphasises the need to invest greater effort and focus into tackling the issue at source.

•  Upstream IED prevention : This fifth edition of CAR’s Diversion Digest presents cases from the field showing how field monitoring and trace investigations support a range of upstream efforts to address the threat of improvised explosive devices (IEDs).

•  Red Flags in Trade Data : An analysis of how using customs and shipping records can inform investigations into the diversion of precursor materials used in improvised explosive devices.

•  Islamic State weapons In high-profile operations in North-East Syria : In 2021 and 2022, Islamic State cells in north-east Syria launched three complex attacks on detention centers holding IS prisoners. This report by CAR examines the weapons used, revealing common links in the materiel, indicating a centralized network supporting high-profile operations.

•  Procurement networks behind Islamic State improvised weapon programmes : The findings of an 18-month investigation mapping the human and financial networks behind the global procurement of goods and technologies for Islamic State weapons production.