British Gov’t Set to Scrap Cluster Bombs

Posted on May 27, 2008

AP photo / Mohammed Zaatari

The U.K. is moving toward getting rid of all cluster bombs in its armory in keeping with growing international efforts to ban the bombs, which spread miniature “bomblets” and have caused many civilian deaths around the world.

The Guardian:

Cluster weapons are highly controversial because they scatter small “bomblets” over a wide area. Many of them do not explode on impact and are activated later by civilians. They caused more than 200 civilian casualties in the year after the Lebanon ceasefire, and more civilian casualties in Iraq in 2003 and Kosovo in 1999 than any other weapon system.

[...] Human rights groups campaigning for a ban on all cluster bombs said yesterday [Tuesday] the planned treaty was being threatened by the refusal of the US to remove stocks from its airforce bases on UK territory.

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