DUBLIN (AFP) — A landmark convention banning cluster bombs was welcomed by politicians and campaigners Thursday but some questioned its worth without backing from key powers like the United States, China and Russia.
After 10 days of painstaking negotiations at Croke Park stadium in Dublin, diplomats from 111 countries agreed Wednesday the wording of a pact to outlaw the use, production, transfer and stockpiling of cluster munitions.
Norway, which led the initiative, insisted the treaty would stigmatise the use of cluster bombs and could not be ignored by those countries keeping their stockpiles.
"It would have been better if they were all here but the approach we have chosen is the realistic approach and it was not realistic to have them here," Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere told AFP.
"We have an ambitious result. I believe this has a norm-setting function.
"If the purpose is to win hearts and minds, do you win hearts and minds by not distinguishing between a military target and civilians?"
He said the text would have been better had the world's major producers and users of cluster bombs attended.
"But would the world be better off if we dropped the whole thing because they are not here? The answer is no. They are bound to notice what we are saying."
The treaty is due to be signed in Oslo on December 2-3.
British newspaper The Independent said the agreement should be seen as a step forward rather than the "final destination".
"The most glaring problem is that the United States, China, Russia, Pakistan, India and Israel have not signed the treaty," it said in its editorial.
"If the largest militaries on the planet refuse to curb their stockpiles of these weapons, what real good can it do?"
Cluster munitions are among the weapons posing the gravest dangers to civilians, especially in heavily bombed countries like Laos, Vietnam and Afghanistan.
Dropped from planes or fired from artillery, they explode in mid-air, randomly scattering bomblets. Countries are seeking a ban due to the risk of civilians being killed or maimed by their indiscriminate, wide area effect.
They also pose a lasting threat to civilians as many bomblets fail to explode on impact.
The treaty requires the destruction of stockpiled munitions within eight years -- though it leaves the door open for future, more precise generations of cluster munitions that pose less harm to civilians.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who agreed to scrap cluster bombs shortly before the deal was reached, said the treaty would be "a major breakthrough".
Pakistan, one of the countries which did not take part, said it was involved in another negotiation under the UN.
"Our concerns are both humanitarian and on security. We will consider the matter when our concerns are addressed," foreign office spokesman Mohammad Sadiq told AFP.
The treaty was welcomed by the Cluster Munition Coalition (CMC), an umbrella group of non-governmental organisations, which hopes it will stigmatise cluster munitions.
CMC co-chair Simon Conway told AFP the treaty was a compromise but nonetheless "incredibly strong".
"We're going to end up with a strong treaty that prohibits every cluster bomb that's ever been used, with no transition periods, with strong obligations on clearance and particularly strong obligations on victim assistance," he said.
The cluster munitions ban process, started by Norway in February 2007, took the same path as the 1997 Ottawa Treaty on landmines by going outside the United Nations to avoid vetoes and seal a swift pact.
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