Ordinance
on Private Security Services
provided Abroad
(OPSA)

¹ A com­plex en­vir­on­ment is any area:

a.

ex­per­i­en­cing or re­cov­er­ing from un­rest, or in­stabil­ity due to nat­ur­al dis­aster or armed con­flict in terms of the Geneva Con­ven­tions² and Ad­di­tion­al Pro­to­cols I and II³;

b.

where the rule of law has been sub­stan­tially un­der­mined; and

c.

in which the ca­pa­city of the state au­thor­ity to handle the situ­ation is lim­ited or non-ex­ist­ent.

² If the Con­fed­er­a­tion con­tracts with a com­pany for the per­form­ance of pro­tec­tion tasks in an area that is not a com­plex en­vir­on­ment in terms of para­graph 1, the Or­din­ance of 24 June 2015⁴ on the Use of Private Se­cur­ity Com­pan­ies ap­plies.

¹ Op­er­a­tion­al sup­port for armed or se­cur­ity forces com­prises activ­it­ies that a com­pany car­ries out for the be­ne­fit of armed or se­cur­ity forces in con­nec­tion with their core tasks as part of on­go­ing or planned op­er­a­tions.

² Lo­gist­ic­al sup­port for armed or se­cur­ity forces com­prise activ­it­ies that a com­pany car­ries out for the be­ne­fit of armed or se­cur­ity forces in close con­nec­tion with their core tasks, in par­tic­u­lar:

a.

ser­vi­cing, re­pair­ing or up­grad­ing war ma­ter­i­el pur­su­ant to the War Ma­ter­i­el Act of 13 Decem­ber 1996⁶ (WMA) or goods pur­su­ant to the Goods Con­trol Act of 13 Decem­ber 1996⁷ (GCA);

b.

con­vert­ing goods in­to war ma­ter­i­el pur­su­ant to the WMA or in­to goods pur­su­ant to the GCA;

c.

con­struct­ing, op­er­at­ing or main­tain­ing in­fra­struc­ture;

d.

man­aging sup­plies;

e.

trans­port­ing, stor­ing or hand­ling war ma­ter­i­el pur­su­ant to the WMA or spe­cif­ic mil­it­ary goods pur­su­ant to the GCA;

f.

trans­port­ing mem­bers of armed or se­cur­ity forces.

¹ The op­er­a­tion of weapons sys­tems com­prises the use of war ma­ter­i­el pur­su­ant to the WMA⁹ with a view to armed or se­cur­ity forces con­duct­ing ex­er­cises.

² The ser­vi­cing of weapons sys­tems com­prises the main­ten­ance or re­pair of war ma­ter­i­el pur­su­ant to the WMA for the be­ne­fit of armed or se­cur­ity forces.

¹ Ad­vising mem­bers of armed or se­cur­ity forces com­prises the pro­vi­sion of tech­nic­al, tac­tic­al or stra­tegic ad­vice to mem­bers of armed or se­cur­ity forces in close con­nec­tion with their core tasks.

² Train­ing mem­bers of armed or se­cur­ity forces com­prises the tech­nic­al, tac­tic­al or stra­tegic in­struc­tion or train­ing of mem­bers of armed or se­cur­ity forces in close con­nec­tion with their core tasks.

Com­pan­ies are deemed to have ac­ceded to the In­ter­na­tion­al Code of Con­duct for Private Se­cur­ity Ser­vice Pro­viders (the Code of Con­duct) in its ver­sion of 9 Novem­ber 2010 if they are mem­bers of the In­ter­na­tion­al Code of Con­duct for Private Se­cur­ity Ser­vice Pro­viders As­so­ci­ation (ICo­CA)¹¹.

The com­pet­ent au­thor­ity is the State Sec­ret­ari­at of the Fed­er­al De­part­ment of For­eign Af­fairs (State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA)¹².

The de­clar­a­tion re­quire­ment cov­ers:

a.

with re­gard to the in­ten­ded activ­ity:

1.

the nature of the ser­vice un­der Art­icle 4 let­ters a and b PSSA,

2.

the weapons and oth­er means used to provide the private se­cur­ity ser­vice,

3.

the ex­tent and dur­a­tion of the op­er­a­tion and the num­ber of per­sons de­ployed,

4.

the place where the activ­ity is car­ried out,

5.

the spe­cial risks that the activ­ity en­tails;

b.

with re­gard to the com­pany:

1.

the com­pany name, re­gistered of­fice and leg­al form as well as, if avail­able, an ex­tract from the com­mer­cial re­gister,

2.

the ob­jects, areas of busi­ness, areas of op­er­a­tion abroad and main cat­egor­ies of cli­ents,

3.

proof of ac­ces­sion to the Code of Con­duct,

4.

the name, first name, date of birth, na­tion­al­ity and cer­ti­fic­ate of res­id­ence of the mem­bers of the man­age­ment and the su­per­vis­ory bod­ies,

5.

the meas­ures taken for the ba­sic and ad­vanced train­ing of per­son­nel,

6.

the in­tern­al con­trol sys­tem for per­son­nel;

c.

with re­gard to the per­sons who carry out man­age­ment du­ties with­in the com­pany or on its be­half or who are per­mit­ted to carry a weapon in the course of their activ­it­ies for the com­pany:

1.

the name, first name, date of birth, na­tion­al­ity and cer­ti­fic­ate of res­id­ence,

2.

con­firm­a­tion of good char­ac­ter,

3.

the re­quired au­thor­isa­tion un­der the rel­ev­ant law for ex­port­ing, car­ry­ing and us­ing weapons, weapons ac­cessor­ies and am­muni­tion,

4.

ba­sic and ad­vanced train­ing in the fields of fun­da­ment­al rights and hu­man­it­ari­an in­ter­na­tion­al law,

5.

ba­sic and ad­vanced train­ing in the use of weapons and aids as well as the use of force and oth­er po­lice meas­ures.

The com­pany shall in­form the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA of the iden­tity of the prin­cip­al or the re­cip­i­ent of a ser­vice un­der Art­icle 4 let­ters a and b PSSA if the per­son or en­tity con­cerned is:

a.

a for­eign state or its in­sti­tu­tions;

b.

an in­ter­na­tion­al or­gan­isa­tion or its in­sti­tu­tions;

c.

a group that re­gards it­self as the gov­ern­ment or as a state in­sti­tu­tion, or its in­sti­tu­tions;

d.

an or­gan­ised armed group or its units par­ti­cip­at­ing in an armed con­flict in terms of the Geneva Con­ven­tions¹³ and the Ad­di­tion­al Pro­to­cols I and II¹⁴;

e.

a high rep­res­ent­at­ive of a for­eign state or of an in­ter­na­tion­al or­gan­isa­tion, a lead­er or a seni­or ex­ec­ut­ive of a group un­der let­ters c and d, ir­re­spect­ive of wheth­er the per­son con­cerns acts in the course of their du­ties or as a private in­di­vidu­al.

Where a com­pany has de­clared a private se­cur­ity ser­vice un­der Art­icle 4 let­ter a num­ber 1 or 2 PSSA and in­tends to provide this ser­vice in stand­ard­ised form to sim­il­ar re­cip­i­ents sub­ject to the same con­di­tions, it shall re­port the con­clu­sion of each new con­tract to the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA and state that the ser­vice agreed therein will be provided in stand­ard­ised form.

Where a com­pany in­tends to con­tin­ue to carry on an activ­ity that it has de­clared in same man­ner, and if the in­form­a­tion provided un­der Art­icle 4 is still cor­rect, so the com­pany shall con­firm to the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA that the in­ten­ded activ­ity cor­res­ponds to the re­por­ted activ­ity.

Where a private se­cur­ity ser­vice un­der Art­icle 4 let­ter a sec­tions 1–3 PSSA must be provided in an emer­gency situ­ation, the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA shall no­ti­fy the com­pany if pos­sible with­in two work­ing days of re­ceipt of the de­clar­a­tion of wheth­er the re­view pro­ced­ure will be ini­ti­ated.

¹ If a com­pany ex­ports war ma­ter­i­el pur­su­ant to the WMA¹⁶ or goods pur­su­ant to the GCA¹⁷ and if it sub­sequently car­ries out ser­vi­cing, main­ten­ance, or a re­pair in close con­nec­tion there­with, the com­pany is not ob­liged to re­port these activ­it­ies provided the ex­port would still be per­mit­ted at the time the activ­it­ies are car­ried out.

² If a com­pany war ex­ports ma­ter­i­el pur­su­ant to the WMA or goods pur­su­ant to the GCA and if it sub­sequently provides ad­vice or train­ing in close con­nec­tion there­with re­lat­ing to the ser­vi­cing, main­ten­ance, re­pair, de­vel­op­ment, man­u­fac­ture or use of the ma­ter­i­el, the com­pany is not ob­liged to re­port these activ­it­ies provided the ex­port would still be per­mit­ted at the time the activ­it­ies are car­ried out.

³ If a com­pany trans­fers in­tel­lec­tu­al prop­erty in­clud­ing knowhow or rights thereto pur­su­ant to the WMA and if it sub­sequently provides ad­vice or train­ing in close con­nec­tion there­with re­lat­ing to ser­vi­cing, main­ten­ance, re­pair, de­vel­op­ment, man­u­fac­ture or use, the com­pany is not ob­liged to re­port these activ­it­ies provided the trans­fer would still be per­mit­ted at the time the activ­it­ies are car­ried out.

⁴ This Art­icle does not ap­ply if the activ­ity con­sti­tutes op­er­a­tion­al sup­port.

¹ The State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA shall de­cide on wheth­er to pro­hib­it the re­por­ted activ­ity in agree­ment with the State Sec­ret­ari­at for Eco­nom­ic Af­fairs (SECO) and the re­spons­ible body at the Fed­er­al De­part­ment of De­fence, Civil Pro­tec­tion and Sport (DDPS) after con­sult­ing the Fed­er­al In­tel­li­gence Ser­vice.

² If the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA, SECO and the re­spons­ible body at the DDPS are un­able to reach an agree­ment or if they con­clude that the re­por­ted activ­ity is of con­sid­er­able im­port­ance to for­eign or se­cur­ity policy, the Fed­er­al De­part­ment of For­eign Af­fairs (FD­FA) shall sub­mit the mat­ter to the Fed­er­al Coun­cil for a de­cision.

³ In cases of minor im­port­ance or in cases where there is a pre­ced­ent for the de­cision, the au­thor­it­ies con­cerned may de­cide to dis­pense with joint con­sid­er­a­tion and au­thor­ise the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA to de­cide on its own.

¹ Where a com­pany with­draws from the ICo­CA or if the ICo­CA de­cides to ex­clude the com­pany, the com­pany shall im­me­di­ately no­ti­fy the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA of this and provide the reas­ons.

² If the reas­ons for the com­pany’s with­draw­al or ex­clu­sion from the ICo­CA do not fun­da­ment­ally pre­clude its re­newed ac­ces­sion, the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA shall re­quest the com­pany to take the meas­ures re­quired to join again with­in six months.

³ Where the com­pany does not join the ICo­CA again with­in the peri­od spe­cified in para­graph 2, the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA shall pro­hib­it all or part of its activ­it­ies.

¹ The fee is as­sessed on the basis of the time worked.

² An hourly rate of 150–350 francs ap­plies. The rate is based in par­tic­u­lar on the seni­or­ity of the em­ploy­ee con­cerned.

³ Oth­er­wise, the Gen­er­al Fees Or­din­ance of 8 Septem­ber 2004¹⁹ ap­plies.

¹ The com­pany is ob­liged to keep re­cords of its activ­it­ies. It must be able to provide the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA with the fol­low­ing in­form­a­tion and doc­u­ments at any time:

a.

the iden­tity and ad­dress of the prin­cip­al, the pro­vider and the re­cip­i­ent of the ser­vice;

b.

a copy of the con­tract con­cluded with the prin­cip­al;

c.

the iden­tity of the per­sons im­ple­ment­ing the con­tract;

d.

de­tails of the equip­ment used, in par­tic­u­lar weapons;

e.

doc­u­ment­ary evid­ence of per­form­ance of the con­tract.

² The mem­bers of man­age­ment board shall re­tain the in­for­ma­tion and doc­u­ments men­tioned in para­graph 1 for ten years. This peri­od does not end if the com­pany ceases busi­ness op­er­a­tions.

¹ In or­der to ful­fil its stat­utory du­ties, the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA is au­thor­ised to pro­cess par­tic­u­larly sens­it­ive per­son­al data on ad­min­is­trat­ive or crim­in­al pro­sec­u­tions and sanc­tions as well as oth­er per­son­al data provided it relates to the fol­low­ing per­sons:

a.

the mem­bers of the man­age­ment board and the su­per­vis­ory bod­ies;

b.

the com­pany per­son­nel;

c.

the com­pany con­cerned;

d.

the prin­cip­al and the re­cip­i­ent of the ser­vice with­in the lim­its set out in Art­icle 5.

² The fol­low­ing per­son­al data may be pro­cessed:

a.

name, first name, date of birth, dom­i­cile and na­tion­al­ity of the per­son con­cerned;

b.

all per­son­al data re­lated to the com­pany con­cerned;

c.

all in­form­a­tion re­lated to the com­pany’s busi­ness op­er­a­tions.

³ The State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA is also au­thor­ised to pro­cess the fol­low­ing par­tic­u­larly sens­it­ive per­son­al data on ad­min­is­trat­ive or crim­in­al pro­sec­u­tions and sanc­tions:

a.

name, first name, date of birth, dom­i­cile and na­tion­al­ity the per­son con­cerned;

b.

iden­tity of the com­pany con­cerned;

c.

the of­fence with which the per­son con­cerned is charged;

d.

de­tails on the form of pro­ced­ure;

e.

name of the au­thor­it­ies con­cerned;

f.

copy of the judg­ment and any oth­er in­form­a­tion con­nec­ted with the judg­ment.

⁴ Per­son­al data and par­tic­u­larly sens­it­ive per­son­al data shall be offered 15 years after its fi­nal pro­cessing to the Fed­er­al Archives for archiv­ing (Art. 21 of the Fed­er­al Act of 19 June 1992²⁰ on Data pro­tec­tion).

¹ The State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA shall provide the au­thor­it­ies men­tioned in Art­icle 28 PSSA, ex of­fi­cio or on re­quest, with the fol­low­ing in­form­a­tion and per­son­al data:

a.

with re­gard to the in­ten­ded activ­ity:

1.

the type of ser­vice un­der Art­icle 4 let­ters a and b PSSA,

2.

the iden­tity of the prin­cip­al or the re­cip­i­ent of the ser­vice with­in the lim­its set out in Art­icle 5,

3.

the loc­a­tion abroad where the activ­ity is be­ing car­ried out;

b.

with re­gard to the com­pany:

1.

com­pany name, re­gistered of­fice and leg­al form as well as, if avail­able, an ex­tract from the com­mer­cial re­gister,

2.

ob­jects, areas of busi­ness, areas of op­er­a­tion abroad and main cat­egor­ies of cli­ents,

3.

name, first name, date of birth, na­tion­al­ity and cer­ti­fic­ate of res­id­ence for the mem­bers of the man­age­ment board and the su­per­vis­ory bod­ies.

² It shall also provide the au­thor­it­ies men­tioned in Art­icle 28 para­graph 2 let­ters c and d PSSA and the fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies re­spons­ible for safe­guard­ing ex­tern­al se­cur­ity (Art. 28 para. 2 let. e PSSA), ex of­fi­cio or on re­quest, with the fol­low­ing par­tic­u­larly sens­it­ive per­son­al data:

a.

name, first name, date of birth, dom­i­cile and na­tion­al­ity of the per­son con­cerned;

b.

iden­tity of the com­pany con­cerned;

c.

the of­fence with which the per­son con­cerned is charged;

d.

de­tails on the form of pro­ced­ure;

e.

name of the au­thor­it­ies con­cerned;

f.

copy of the judg­ment and any oth­er in­form­a­tion con­nec­ted with the judg­ment.

¹ The con­tract with the com­pany shall re­quire the com­pany in par­tic­u­lar to:

a.

provide in­form­a­tion on pro­gress with the per­form­ance of the con­tract if the con­tract­ing au­thor­ity so re­quests;

b.

dis­close the iden­tity of the per­son­nel de­ployed to the con­tract­ing au­thor­ity;

c.

pre­pare a re­port for sub­mis­sion to the con­tract­ing au­thor­ity;

d.

im­me­di­ately re­place any per­son­nel who do not have the re­quired skills or who ad­versely af­fect the per­form­ance of the con­tract;

e.

im­me­di­ately re­port to the con­tract­ing au­thor­ity any cir­cum­stances that could ad­versely af­fect the per­form­ance of the con­tract;

f.

im­me­di­ately re­port to the con­tract­ing au­thor­ity any in­cid­ents in which per­son­nel have used force or po­lice meas­ures in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 35 PSSA or have ac­ted in self-de­fence or in a situ­ation of ne­ces­sity;

g.

im­me­di­ately re­port to the con­tract­ing au­thor­ity if the re­quire­ments for the com­pany or for train­ing are no longer be­ing met.

² The con­tract shall also con­tain:

a.

the de­tails re­quired by Art­icles 34 para­graph 2 and 35 PSSA;

b.

pro­vi­sion for con­trac­tu­al pen­al­ties in the event of non-ful­fil­ment.

¹ The FD­FA shall is­sue a mod­el con­tract.²¹

² The mod­el con­tract shall be made ac­cess­ible on­line.

The con­tract­ing au­thor­ity shall provide the State Sec­ret­ari­at FD­FA and the head of se­cur­ity of its de­part­ment with a copy of the con­tract con­cluded with the com­pany and in­form the head of se­cur­ity of any prob­lem re­lated to the per­form­ance of the con­tract.

In re­gions where there is no com­pany that is a mem­ber of the ICo­CA, the FD­FA shall en­deav­our to en­sure that com­pan­ies joint the as­so­ci­ation.

The con­tract­ing au­thor­ity shall by 1 Septem­ber 2018 amend ex­ist­ing con­tracts that do not meet the re­quire­ments of this Or­din­ance.

This Or­din­ance comes in­to force on 1 Septem­ber 2015.