Lyn Allison (Victoria, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—The report resulted from the referral of the Cluster Munitions (Prohibition) Bill 2006a Democrats bill—to the committee. The effect of that bill was to ban Australia’s involvement in cluster munitions. The bill arose from a visit I made to Lebanon in October last year, where it became very clear to me—and to the rest of the world—that cluster munitions in that conflict had left a legacy of destruction that would go on harming civilian populations for many years to come and that, in effect, cluster munitions had taken the place of landmines. Ninety-eight per cent of those killed by cluster munitions are civilians and many of those are children.

The Democrats were very disappointed that the submission of the Australian armed forces indicated that Australia would not accept the ban or the bill. Not only did they not wish to have that ban in place but they announced for the first time that Australia would acquire its own submunitions and that that was the reason for their opposition. The Democrats were disappointed with that finding. The committee’s report said that the newer, self-destruct munitions should be exempt from any ban, despite evidence that showed that these weapons still carried serious failure rates and caused unacceptable humanitarian harm.

In terms of Australia owning its own submunitions, we argued that this would diminish Australia’s capacity to persuade other countries to take seriously the impact of cluster munitions on civilians. There was plenty of evidence brought to the inquiry to that effect. It seems so incongruous, given the international moves to ban cluster munitions, that Australia would be a latecomer, as it were, in acquiring these munitions for itself.

I am grateful to the Senate for referring this bill for inquiry. I think it was very useful for the committee to receive submissions on the subject. It was disappointing that there was no public hearing, because there was no opportunity to quiz the Department of Defence on the reasons why they acquired these munitions at this late stage, what sorts of models they were proposing to purchase, where they came from, what they cost, what their failure rate might be, the conditions under which they were tested and so on. So it was a disappointment that both major parties determined that we would not have a public hearing into the bill. The overwhelming majority of submissions were in support of either the bill or a version of the bill which would be very restrictive on the way in which cluster munitions were used.

The inquiry was given a lot of evidence about the huge humanitarian cost to civilians. In Lebanon last year more than 1,000 cluster munitions were dropped, leaving the country littered with more than a million bomblets—devices which continue to kill year after year, as I said. Up to 50 per cent of those became unexploded ordnance as a result of that conflict. Of course, it is not the only country where they have been dropped. There have been others—for instance, Afghanistan and Iraq. And in Asia, in Vietnam and Cambodia, there are millions littering the countryside, making it almost impossible for people to go about their daily business, whether it is farming or it is children on their way to school, and they remain an enormous threat to people.

After the conflict in Lebanon, on 7 November the UN Secretary-General called on state parties to the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons to immediately address the atrocious, inhumane effects of cluster munitions at the time of their use and long after conflicts end, and to devise effective norms that will reduce and ultimately eliminate the horrendous humanitarian and developmental impact of these weapons. UNICEF Australia said that unexploded cluster bombs left over from conflict violate a number of articles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, including those which relate to a child’s right to life, to a safe environment in which to play, to health, to clean water, to sanitary conditions and to adequate education.

This was both a timely bill and a timely inquiry, because world leaders—and, as I have just mentioned, only two of them—have been calling for international action. It was the case that Norway was the first country to really make moves in this direction. It called a conference in Oslo some months ago. Unfortunately, the Australian government decided not to attend this meeting. That is a great pity because there were 46 governments in attendance at that conference in Oslo in February this year. They agreed to conclude by 2008 a legally binding, international instrument that would prohibit the use, production, transfer and stockpiling of cluster munitions that caused unacceptable harm to civilians; to establish a framework for cooperation and assistance that would ensure adequate provision of care and rehabilitation of survivors and their communities, clearance of contaminated areas, risk education and destruction of stockpiles of prohibited cluster munitions; and to consider taking steps at a national level to address these problems. Also, they agreed to continue to address the humanitarian challenges posed by cluster munitions within the framework of international humanitarian law and in all relevant areas, and to meet again to continue their work in Lima in May-June, in Vienna in November-December and in Dublin in early 2008.

So it was pleasing that, despite not turning up to Oslo and pretty much ignoring that initiative, Australia did go to Lima in May-June. We certainly hope that the Department of Defence also goes to the Vienna meeting in November-December—and not only goes but argues very strongly for an international convention. I think it is important that our delegation at that meeting is properly informed about the dangers of cluster munitions and the risk of having a partial ban on these nasty weapons. It is much simpler, I would argue, for Australia to take a line which says: ‘There are some munitions which may be better than others but, by and large, they still inappropriately and disproportionately harm civilians. For that reason, whether they are regarded as so-called smart, whether they have self-destruct features or whether they are self-guided, they are still munitions which can disperse submunitions over large distances, and this is what makes them unacceptable in humanitarian terms.’

The government argued that there were already adequate measures in place for cluster munitions and argued that protocol V to the conventional weapons convention bound countries to particular actions. But, at the end of the day, all that protocol does is set out the obligations on countries that use cluster munitions to mark them, to clear them, to remove and destroy those that do not explode and to record, retain and transmit information about where they might be. As we know from the Lebanese conflict, that did not happen. It took some time for Israel to provide any sort of information to Lebanon about the location of the cluster munitions that were let off in Lebanon and, when some information finally came through, it was inadequate.

Protocol V of the conventional weapons convention is not adequate. Other arguments were made—that international humanitarian law guided behaviour with regard to submunitions. But, again, Dr Ben Saul said to the committee via his submission:

Humanitarian law does not expressly prohibit cluster munitions, which are subject to the ordinary rules on the means and methods of warfare. In some cases, the use of cluster munitions will comply with the principles of distinction, discrimination, proportionality and necessity; for example, where they are used against massed enemy formations in areas which are clearly distinguished from civilian populations and civilian objects.

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While they are not inherently indiscriminate, cluster munitions may be unlawfully indiscriminate if they are used in contexts where they ‘cannot be directed at a specific military objective’ or where their ‘effects’ cannot be limited to military objectives as required—

under the protocol. This whole area—(Time expired)