Obama's State Department Backpedals on Landmine Treaty Stance

[IndianaGreen]

Remember how we were harangued by the board's Administration apologists when we decried Obama's decision to not sign the Landmine Treaty?

Published on Friday, November 27, 2009 by Inter Press Service

Obama's State Department Backpedals on Landmine Treaty Stance

by Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON - One day after the State Department announced that the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama will not sign the 10-year-old treaty banning anti- personnel landmines, it insisted that Washington's policy on the issue was still being reviewed.

Human rights and disarmament activists had reacted with outrage Wednesday to Tuesday's announcement by State Department spokesman Ian Kelly that the review had concluded and that Washington "would not be able to meet our national defense needs, nor our security commitments to our friends and allies if we sign the convention".

"The administration is committed to a comprehensive review of its landmine policy," Kelly said in a written statement issued by the State Department press office Wednesday afternoon. "That review is still ongoing."

The statement did not make clear whether Tuesday's announcement had been made in error or whether the anger provoked by it had persuaded the administration to reconsider. The fact that Kelly was reading from guidance prepared in advance and presumably cleared at higher levels, however, suggested that the latter explanation was more likely.

The U.S. Campaign to Ban Landmines (USCBL), a coalition of scores of activist groups, had called the Tuesday's announcement "shocking", while Human Rights Watch (HRW) described it as "reprehensible".

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/11/27-2

Related earlier story:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=103&topic_id=498110