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Cluster bombs

Major powers absent from cluster bomb conference

Article published on the 2009-06-25 Latest update 2009-06-25 13:45 TU

Mozambiquan Foreign Minister Oldemiro Baloi greets a Serbian cluster bomb victim at the conference(Credit: Reuters)

Mozambiquan Foreign Minister Oldemiro Baloi greets a Serbian cluster bomb victim at the conference
(Credit: Reuters)

Germany on Thursday became the 11th country to ratify the 2008 Cluster Bomb Agreement, as major powers such as the US, Russia and China stayed away from the two-day international conference in Berlin. The Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM), if brought into force after 30 countries ratify the text, would give signatories eight years to destroy their cluster ammunitions.

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The CCM also would require signatories to clear areas of unexploded muntions within ten years and assist victims. While the text garnered signatures from close to 100 countries last year, there are 15 countries who did not sign. Among those countries was Israel, who is accused of using cluster bombs during the war on southern Lebanon against Hezbollah in 2006, and Sri Lanka, who allegedly used these munitions when fighting the Tamil Tigers in their recent final onslaught.

Other non-signatories include South Korea, North Korea, India, Pakistan, turkey, Georgia, Iran, Syria, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Nigeria and Sudan.

A cluster bomb, which is fired at an area or dropped from an aircraft, is composed of smaller 'bomblets' that can explode immediately or remain dormant for years. These bomblets kill or maim mainly civilians, according to Handicap International. The NGO estimates that 98 per cent of victims affected after a conflict are civilians.

The US, a non-signatory, has long argued that destroying its stockpiles of cluster bombs could put US troops in jeopardy. It maintains that cluster bombs result in less collateral damage than big bombs.

Some non-governmental organisations believe that the US is hoarding as many as one billion cluster bomblets, and that China and Russia have just as many.

Cluster Munition Coalition representative Thomas Nash said that he hoped the Berlin conference would get countries to ratify the treaty and others to sign the text.

Organisers would like 19 other countries to ratify this year so that it will have the 30 ratifications necessary to move the treaty into force.