WHY THE UK MUST TAKE ACTION

The UK Government has an opportunity to take a lead on this issue despite a poor track-record over the last decade.

In the last ten years... The UK has been one of the world’s largest users of cluster munitions. Despite protests from organisations concerned with human rights, international law, medical assistance and landmine clearance, the UK dropped nearly 200,000 submunitions on Kosovo and Iraq and plans to continue using them in future conflicts.

Through these actions the UK has contributed to immediate and long term suffering amongst people we said we were acting to help. Unexploded UK cluster munitions are still being found in Kosovo more than seven years after the conflict and despite more than £50 million spent on clearance work. In March 2003, UK cluster munitions caused unnecessary civilian casualties in Iraq; the security situation since then means the full extent of civilian harm may never be known. The UK’s actions were supposed to be driven by determination to protect the civilian population. Using internationally condemned weapons risks turning those people against us.

The UK has done nothing to evaluate the suffering caused by its use of these weapons. Despite claiming to be “confident that the right balance has been struck” between likely civilian harm and military needs regarding cluster munitions, it has been revealed that the UK has conducted “no reviews or assessments” of the humanitarian impact of these weapons. How can they ‘balance’ something they know nothing about?

The UK has ignored or tried to discredit evidence gathered by others regarding this civilian harm. Examples of civilian casualties documented by non-governmental organisations and the media have been described as “unproven”, “unsubstantiated” or “anecdotal” despite the UK Government gathering no such information of its own.

The UK has made misleading statements on the likely risks from cluster munition use. During the bombing of Kosovo in 1999, Defence Secretary George Robertson claimed the failure rate of these munitions “could be as low as 1%”. This claim was based on no evidence. UN mine clearers think 20% would have been more realistic. In March 2006, the Ministry of Defence claimed that its estimates regarding reliability utilised “field data” but in July 2006 Adam Ingram, Minister of State for the Armed Forces, admitted that no analysis had been done of the reliability of these bombs during operations.

The UK has continued to use cluster bombs they acknowledge are “unacceptable.” In February 2005 the UK stated that its “air dropped cluster bombs have a failure rate that is unacceptably high.” Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland have all given up these munitions and begun destroying their stockpiles. The UK keeps them available for use.

Landmine Action believes it is negligent for the Government to have so little regard for the lives of innocent civilians. If it were British children that were being put at risk, the product would have been recalled and those responsible would be held to account.

Attachments

	Published in November 2005, “Out of Balance” provides an analysis of the UK government practices regarding cluster munitions and the implementation of international humanitarian law (IHL) and reveals not just fundamental inadequacies of UK practice but also serious areas of concern for the broader IHL programme. Click on the image to download a pdf of the full report.
	“Failure to Protect”, launched during the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) in Geneva in August 2006, lays out the policy framework of Landmine Action in relation to cluster munitions. It provides the broad basis for Landmine Action's call for a prohibition on the use, stockpiling, production and transfer of these weapons. Click on the image to download a pdf of the full report.