. . Move would help minimize civility maiming, casualties
BY NAOMI KOPPEL
ASSOCIATED PRESS
GENEVA — World governments are ready to approve a new treaty that would force governments to clean up unexploded cluster bombs and other ordnance at the end of a war, an Indian diplomat closely involved in the process said today.
"With effective implementation of this protocol, the risks should be progressively reduced and civilian lives should be saved," said Rakesh Sood, the Indian ambassador on disarmament issues in Geneva.
"It is no longer possible for parties to a conflict to just walk away from the post-conflict consequences of the munitions that they have used," Sood said.
/snip/
There are no firm figures on the level of the problem of war remnants worldwide, but the
United States acknowledges that there are between 650,000 and one million tonnes of unexploded ammunition in Iraq alone — ammunition dumps as well as unexploded grenades, rockets and cluster bombs. U.S. occupation forces have begun to clean them up, but the job could take a decade.
"Orange-sized cluster bomblets, scattered by warplanes to disrupt enemy ground operations and airfields, can lie unexploded for years until someone touches them. They have been blamed for killing and maiming more than 200 civilians in the Serbian province of Kosovo since the 1999 NATO bombing."
/snip/
AND,
- we know that these cluster bombs are taking their toll in Iraq, especially with children who think they are some kind of "toy" - until the "toy" sends them to the hereafter
- I seem to remember that the UN or Amnesty International - or both consider these "cluster bombs" illegal
- oh right
- "illegal" don't cut it with Bu$Co and his gang of thugs
(sigh)