Arms exporting nations must enforce their own rules and not sell weapons to countries who are paying with money diverted from health or social policies, international aid organisation Oxfam said on Tuesday.
In a report entitled "Guns or Growth?" Oxfam said countries in Asia, the Middle East, Latin America and Africa were spending on average $22 billion a year on arms - most of which were coming from the five permanent members of the UN security council.
"Government failure to stick to their own promises on arms exports means that children are denied an education, AIDS sufferers are not getting treatment and thousands are dying needlessly," said Oxfam director Barbara Stocking.
She called for countries with rules to enforce them and for the creation of an international arms trade treaty to install and enforce socially responsible rules on sales of weapons.
The report, also involving Amnesty International, the International Action Network on Small Arms, Ploughshares and Saferworld said only Britain and the Netherlands even consulted their development departments over arms sales.
Hardly any countries had ever denied a requested sale on the grounds of sustainable development, and only a handful had said they would ever consider doing so.
"Government should be ashamed at their broken promises. Inappropriate arms sales are responsible for entrenching and exacerbating poverty," Saferworld director Paul Eavis said.
"Despite assurances, most governments are still only paying lip service to assessing arms sales against their impact on poverty," he added.
The report said between $50 and $60 billion was spent globally each year on aid, with $900 billion going on defence.
Countries such as Oman, Syria, Myanmar, Pakistan, Eritrea and Burundi spent more on arms than they did on health and education combined, it said.
Arms delivered to Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa in 2002 together made up two-thirds of the value of all arms deliveries world-wide, it added.
The report noted that in sub-Saharan Africa, military spending had boomed while life expectancy had slumped.
In particular it criticised South Africa's 1999 decision to spend upwards of $6 billion on warships, submarines and military jets - saying the money would have been far better spent on fighting the AIDS pandemic.
The suppliers of this equipment included Britain, Sweden, Germany and France.
"To protect the social and economic rights of people in developing countries, it is imperative that exporting governments apply an effective and systematic methodology to assess whether proposed arms transfers will affect sustainable development," the report said.