Middle East News
Cluster bomb wounds Lebanese citizen in south Lebanon
Mar 13, 2009, 12:24 GMT
Beirut - A 20-year-old man was wounded in southern Lebanon Friday by the explosion of a cluster bomb left over from the July 2006 war between Israel and the Hezbollah organization, Lebanese police said.
Hussein Hamiyeh was seriously wounded as he was working in a field near his home in Qana, east of the southern port city of Tyre, said police.
Between July 12 and August 14, 2006, Israel's armed forces dropped about one million cluster bomblets on southern Lebanon, the majority during the final days of the conflict.
So far local and international deminers in southern Lebanon have cleared about 155,000 cluster bomblets, while more than 320 people have been killed or injured by cluster bomb explosions since the end of the 2006 conflict.
According to UN reports Israel's showering of south Lebanon was one of the worst uses of cluster bombs in history and spurred the formation of an international treaty banning their use, production and sale. A total of 95 countries signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions in Oslo, Norway, last December.
The key weapons-producing states - the United States, Russia, China and Israel - refused to sign, arguing for their right to use cluster bombs in self-defence. Among the signatories were important European powers such as France, Germany and Britain. From the Arab nations, only Lebanon and Tunisia signed.
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