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Cluster Munitions

Cluster Munitions. The Oslo Process. What are cluster munitions?. They are weapons that include cargo containers and submunitions which are fired, launched or dropped by aircraft or land-based artillery.

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Cluster Munitions

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  1. Cluster Munitions The Oslo Process

  2. What are cluster munitions? • They are weapons that include cargo containers and submunitions which are fired, launched or dropped by aircraft or land-based artillery. • The containers open over a target area and disperse large numbers of the submunitions that are designed to explode when they hit the target. • Most of these submunitions are fragmentation weapons that include a shaped charge so that they are effective against soldiers as well as armoured vehicles. The vast majority of cluster munitions contain hundreds of submunitions that are unguided and that cover one square kilometre with explosions and shrapnel. • Cluster munitions are also called cluster bombs or cluster weapons. Submunitions are sometimes called bomblets.

  3. Why are they bad? • Indiscriminate weapon • When dropped they may cover vast territory and find their way into civilian-inhabited areas • Unexploded bomblets or submunitions can compromise the safety of civilians well after a conflict has ended.

  4. The Oslo Process: a ban on cluster bombs • The Norwegian government announced in November 2006 that it intended to establish a treaty that ban cluster bombs. • This was a decision that resulted from the failure of the UN Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) to agree to urgent action to address the humanitarian impact of cluster munitions at the third review conference in November 2006, despite five years of discussions around the issue and calls from 30 nations in support of negotiations. • In February 2007, the Norwegian Government launched an initiative with a meeting of states in Oslo, now commonly known as the ‘Oslo Process’. At the end of the conference, 46 nations, agreed to a declaration committing to conclude a treaty banning cluster munitions that cause unacceptable harm to civilians by 2008. • Canada was one of the countries which agreed to the declaration of prohibiting the use, production, transfer and stockpiling of cluster munitions that cause unacceptable harm to civilians. • In addition, they would consider taking steps at the national level to address these problems and continue to address the humanitarian challenges posed by cluster munitions within the framework of IHL and meet at the following conferences of Lima, Vienna, Dublin.

  5. So what happens now? • Governments are aware • Some governments are feeling the pressure but not enough • Check out http://www.minesactioncanada.org/home/index.cfm?fuse=Home.PetitionSignup

  6. Sources • www.stopclustermunitions.org • http://www.minesactioncanada.org/

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