Keep cluster munitions out of children's hands
There are millions of pieces of unexploded weapons scattered around the world. To kids, some of them look like toys or trinkets, inviting them to play. But even though some of them are decades old, they still explode when disturbed, maiming and killing innocent children.
UNICEF's video for International Landmine Awareness Day 2011.
A cluster bomb is designed to come apart in the air, dispersing up to 2,000 bomblets to saturate an area. However, in older weapons, too many of the bomblets don't explode on impact. Even though the United States now produces only cluster munitions with a failure rate of less than one percent, our Defense Department still has millions of old cluster munitions in its stockpile with failure rates of as high as 20 percent. That means up to 400 bomblets per shell left scattered on the ground—still armed, still deadly.
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Children At Risk in Libya |
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Children caught up in the conflict in Libya are at great risk from unexploded weapons and ordnance, including cluster munitions. UNICEF is working with Handicap International on mine risk education in Libya. Check out the posts on UNICEF's Facebook page. |
The U.S. Government is a world leader in helping clear these unexploded weapons, including landmines and cluster munitions. UNICEF focuses on Mine Risk Education (MRE) to make children aware of the threat from unexploded weapons. These efforts have made a huge difference: according to the United Nations, in 2009 there were 4,000 casualties worldwide from leftover munitions, down from 26,000 civilians in 1997.
That is still 4,000 too many—especially when 40 percent of those casualties were children.
Cluster Munitions Civilian Protection Act of 2011
In addition to helping finding and eliminate old cluster bombs, as a Nation, we need to make sure that we never use cluster munitions that leave dangerous duds. Right now, unfortunately, that is not current U.S. policy. The U.S. Defense Department says it will give up its outdated, high-failure cluster munitions after 2018. For the next seven years, though, the Pentagon reserves the right to use these weapons.
Some Members of Congress believe that seven years is too long to wait – that there is no justification for using antiquated weapons that so often fail, and so often kill and injure civilians, when we have modern cluster munitions that almost never fail.
The Cluster Munitions Civilian Protection Act of 2011, introduced in the Senate by Sens. Leahy (D-VT) and Feinstein (D-CA), and in the House by Reps. McGovern (D-MA) and Issa (R-CA), would ban the use of cluster munitions with failure rates higher than one percent beginning on the date of enactment, not in 2018. This bill also makes clear that American-made cluster munitions will only be used against clearly defined military targets – not against civilians or in civilian areas.
What you can do
Contact your Representative and Senators and urge them to cosponsor and support S. 558 and H.R. 996, the Cluster Munitions Civilian Protection Act, to help protect children from injury and death caused by these needless weapons!
