109 nations have reached an agreement on a treaty which would ban current designs of cluster bombs, reports BBC online Wednesday.
Diplomats meeting in Dublin agreed to back an international ban on the use of the controversial weapons following 10 days of talks. But some of the worlds main producers and stockpilers – including the US, Russia and China – oppose the move.
UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced that Britain would be taking cluster bombs out of service.
Thomas Nash, from campaign group the Cluster Munition Coalition, said: – This is an incredibly positive document. It is going to set a new norm, a new standard of international behaviour, that will say cluster munitions are unacceptable.
Cluster bombs have been used in countries including Cambodia, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Lebanon. They are made up of a big container which opens in mid-air, dropping hundreds of smaller individual bombs, or sub-munitions, across a wide area.
These “bomblets” usually explode once they hit their target, but can fail to do so, leaving a deadly legacy as civilians return to their homes.
Marc Garlasco, of Human Rights Watch, said even countries that had not made the commitment would be affected. He referred to the mine ban treaty of 1997 that was never signed by the United States, Israel, Russia or China, yet those nations have not used landmines since it came into effect, he said.
– By stigmatising (sætte i skammekrogen) a weapon you are causing nations not to use it and that’s exactly what is going to happen here, he noted.
Anna MacDonald, from Oxfam which has campaigned against cluster bombs, said:
– They have agreed a very strong treaty that will completely ban the production, the use, the stockpiling and transfer of all cluster munitions.
Nevertheless, countries like the US, India, Pakistan and Israel claim such munitions can be highly useful on the battlefield and want to see the treaty watered down.
