Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Dublin (Agenzia Fides) - Today, May 19, a Conference is being held in the Irish capital city of Dublin, on cluster bombs. It is a type of mechanism that causes grave humanitarian problems, whose consequences can last decades. The cluster bomb is a container (air bomb, rocket, missile, or mortar) with hundreds of smaller bombs inside (these are called submunitions). Once it reaches its target, a time or barometric gauge triggers the explosion of the smaller bombs, which are then scattered over a large area. The bombs are programmed to explode when they touch ground, however there is a varying percentile that reach the ground without exploding. These bombs can remain active for many years, becoming a threat to the civilian populations, especially farmers and children, who are intrigued by the object and later become victims of its explosion.
The cluster bombs are implemented in 21 countries, among them being Bosnia, Iraq, Serbia, Kosovo, and Lebanon. These arms were developed during the “Cold War” (although they had already been implemented by some powers during the Second World War) in order to combat large numbers of troops and armed forces, however they have almost never been used towards this original purpose. According to the humanitarian organizations who have been struggling for years for banning their production and use, 98% of the victims of cluster bombs are civilians.
Following in the footsteps of the Treaty that banned anti-personnel mines, signed in Ottawa in 1997, the goal is to reach a similar agreement for the ban of cluster bombs. These smaller bombs that remain active, in fact, have a similar behavior to mines, remaining on the ground and causing drastic humanitarian and economic consequences. An accumulation of years and expenditures are needed to repair the areas struck by these devices, just as occurs with the mines.
The Holy Father Benedict XVI, shortly prior to the Conference in Dublin, during his apostolic visit to Genoa, asked that these “lethal devices” be completely abandoned, in order to avoid terrible sufferings of peoples. Reaching this goal will not be easy, though, as the countries that have not signed the Treaty banning anti-personnel mines have raised technical objections to the banning of the cluster bomb. Their manufacturers affirm the fact that they have placed heavily-reliable triggering devices that make 99% of the bombs explode upon impact, thus reducing the number of bombs remaining activated. There are 210 different kinds of cluster bombs produced by 34 countries, and 75 nations maintain them in their arsenals, making for a grand total of 1 billion submunitions in the world. (LM) (Agenzia Fides 19/5/2008; righe 34, parole 428)
