Cluster munitions are weapons that can disperse up to several hundreds of smaller submunitions - sometimes referred to as “bomblets” - over wide areas. They have indiscriminate wide area effects that kill and injure victims during and even years after a strike. They pose an enormous economic, social and psychological threat to civilians who make up 98 % of all confirmed cluster munition victims.

The European Conference on Cluster Munitions of 30 October, discussing stockpile destruction and victim assistance, can be a major decisive step towards a real solution for the humanitarian problems caused by cluster munitions. Handicap International, a founding member of the Cluster Munition Coalition (CMC), is calling upon all European States to immediately stop the production, use and transfer of cluster munitions, to start the destruction of all existing stockpiles to avoid proliferation, and to provide adequate assistance to the victims of these weapons.

Individuals and communities affected by cluster munitions are calling for a ban in order to prevent further bloodshed and suffering. “European States meeting in Brussels tomorrow should respond to this call by ensuring that affected individuals and communities’ needs are addressed through specific and measurable obligations in the new treaty,” says Rae McGrath, International Spokesperson on Cluster Munitions for the Handicap International Network.

"States such as the UK, Germany and France who have sought exceptions in the future treaty for their own weapons should abandon this policy and join Belgium, Austria, Norway and Hungary in ending the use of cluster munitions through an immediate national moratorium or ban," says Stan Brabant, Head of Handicap International’s Policy Unit in Brussels. Handicap International and more than 200 NGOs worldwide urge States to agree on a treaty banning cluster munitions by the end of 2008.

At least 75 States stockpile cluster munitions containing billions of submunitions. With 34 States having produced cluster munitions and 14 countries - including 4 NATO Member States - having used this weapon in at least 25 countries or territories, only a new treaty on cluster munitions can force users, producers and stockpilers to abandon this weapon and to engage the affected states to meet the needs and rights of their endangered populations. European countries should give up the weapon now.

Click to read Branislav's statement.
Click here to read the latest Ban newsletter.