German Greens call for US to ban cluster bombs ahead of Berlin summit

Jun 24, 2009, 11:24 GMT

Berlin - The co-leader of Germany's Green Party, Claudia Roth, called Tuesday for Chancellor Angela Merkel to put pressure on the US to sign a convention on the use of cluster bombs during a trip to Washington later this week.

Merkel should seize the 'wind of change' that US President Obama had brought to the White House, and encourage the US to join the 98 signatory countries to the Convention on Cluster Munitions, Roth said on the eve of an international cluster bomb conference in Berlin.

Cluster weapons - criticized for carrying a high risk of maiming or killing civilians - can be launched from the air or via artillery shells and can disperse hundreds of bomblets over a target area.

Children are often victims of the weapons, which can remain lodged in the ground for years after being fired, since they sometimes mistake the so-called bomblets for toys.

Roth further said that Germany should use its good relations with China and Russia to play 'an offensive role' in encouraging countries to sign up to the convention, which came into being in Oslo last December.

The two-day talks starting Thursday, hosted by the German Foreign Office, bring together 270 participants from 75 countries to discuss ways of destroying military stockpiles of cluster munitions.

Once the convention comes into effect, signatory states have eight years to destroy military stockpiles of cluster weapons.

Steve Goose, the director of the arms division of Human Rights Watch, hoped the conference would 'push forward the momentum,' encouraging states to join and ratify the convention.

As well as providing a forum to discuss methods of destroying the munitions, Goose said it was also 'a political conference that is aimed at generating the will to do this task as quickly as possible.'

The Convention on Cluster Munitions, which prohibits the use, production, stockpiling and transfer of cluster bombs, comes into effect six months after thirty of its signatories have ratified the document. To date, 10 states have ratified it.

Challenges include the definition of what constitutes a cluster bomb, as well as encouraging government transparency on how many cluster munitions they hold, in order to verify the destruction process.

Some governments, including Germany, have stipulated that the ban does not cover so-called 'smart' cluster munitions, which are supposed to be more sophisticated and therefore reduce the risk of civilian harm.

In Germany, the convention has been passed by both houses of parliament, but is still awaiting the largely symbolic approval of President Horst Koehler.