'Lethal legacy' of cluster bombs

Princess Diana raised profile of campaign against landmines

LONDON, England -- Unexploded bombs are more of a threat to civilians in former war zones than landmines, according to a report by a coalition of more than 50 charities.

Cluster bombs, mortars and rockets kill more innocent people than landmines because there is no legal obligation on those who use such weapons to clear them up afterwards, said Landmine Action.

"UXO (unexploded ordnance) are a forgotten but lethal legacy of every war," said Richard Lloyd, director of Landmine Action, the UK arm of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines which Princess Diana worked for.

"Thousands of people around the world must live with the constant threat as they go about their daily lives."

Landmine Action and the memorial fund set up in honour of the princess, who died in a car crash in 1997, on Monday urged the UK government and the international community to introduce a U.N. protocol to bring unexploded bombs under humanitarian law.

They want countries that use explosive munitions to clear them up, or pay for their removal, when hostilities cease, along with a moratorium on the use and sale of cluster bombs.

These controversial weapons, made up of a container that carries several "bomblets" to the target area, have been used in Vietnam, the Gulf War, Kosovo and Afghanistan since they were first used in the 1960s.

The study focuses on the impact of UXO on a number of countries affected by conflict, particularly Kosovo and Cambodia.

Report said cluster bombs were more likely to kill than landmines

In the year up to August 2001, 397 people were killed or injured in Cambodia by bombs dropped during the civil war between the government and the Khmer Rouge but also by U.S. planes between 1965 and 1973 during the Vietnam War.

In Kosovo between June 1999 and May 2001, the report found, 60 percent of victims of ordnance left after NATO's military campaign were killed by UXO, compared with 37 percent by landmines. Fifty-eight people were killed by UXO and another 97 people were injured -- two thirds of them children -- between June 1999 and May 2001.

Children were more likely to be victims of UXO than landmines because they pick up ordnance without knowing what it is, the report said.

Many of the victims were farm workers and the report predicts UXO could have huge economic consequences such as changes in the use of land or the abandonment of entire communities.

Andrew Purkis, chief executive of the Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Fund, told the Press Association: "This is powerful new evidence that tough humanitarian measures are needed to prevent and clean up the lethal litter of war, especially unexploded bomblets.

"We want strong action by the U.N. Convention on Conventional Weapons in Geneva, and, in the meantime, a moratorium on the use, sale and transport of cluster bombs.

"We should like to see the UK government demonstrate convincing leadership."

NATO warplanes carried out a bombing campaign in Kosovo during a 78-day war in 1999 in an attempt to stop Serbian forces continuing an onslaught on Albanians while Slobodan Milosevic was Yugoslav president.

Milosevic is currently on trial in The Hague accused of genocide in the 1992-95 Bosnian war and crimes against humanity in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo in 1999.

In his defence he said NATO leaders should be in the dock themselves for killing civilians during the bombing campaign, which was mostly undertaken by the United States, Italy, France, Britain and Canada.