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SPAIN: Messages of Peace, Clusters of Bombs

Alicia Fraerman

MADRID, Dec 20 2006 (IPS) - Spain’s socialist government supports peace processes around the world, but at the same time allows Spanish companies to continue manufacturing cluster bombs, one of the weapons with the greatest impact on the civilian population in conflict zones.

In a report released Wednesday, “Bombas de racimo, la lluvia del acero” (“cluster bombs, metal rain”), Greenpeace Spain called for an international ban on the manufacturing and use of these weapons, which were first widely used by U.S. forces during the Vietnam War.

More recently, cluster bombs were reportedly employed by Israel in populated areas of Lebanon in July.

Cluster bombs are dropped in a canister that splits open in mid-air, scattering hundreds of soda-can-size bomblets over large areas. Many of the bomblets do not explode on impact, thus posing a risk to civilians, sometimes for years to come. The bombs are air-dropped or ground-launched.

“These bombs are even more dangerous than antipersonnel mines, because they are designed to kill and not just to injure or block the passage of a vehicle, and they can explode years after they were dropped,” Mabel Gonzaléz, the head of Greenpeace Spain’s disarmament campaign, told IPS.

The Britain-based Handicap International estimates that there are more than 100,000 victims of cluster bombs worldwide, and that arsenals around the world contain an estimated stock of four billion pieces. It also reported that this year they were used in Iraq, Lebanon and Israel.

“It’s ironic that Spain manufactures and sells these bombs to third parties while at the same time sending soldiers to risk their lives searching for and removing the bomblets in countries where they have been used, like Afghanistan or Kosovo (a province of Serbia),” she added.

However, one of the manufacturers in Spain, Instalaza, describes its Mat-120 cluster bomb on its web page as a “Mortar munition with 21 anti-tank and fragmentation sub-munitions whose electronic fuses are equipped with self-destruct and self-neutralisation features, (thus) eliminating the risk of live munitions being left on the ground.”

During the presentation of the report, the executive director of Greenpeace Spain, Juan López de Uralde, said “a government that supports peace cannot allow the Spanish army to possess these weapons or companies in Spain to produce them.”

The administration of socialist Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero “has the chance to demonstrate its commitment to peace by banning the manufacturing, export, stockpiling and use of cluster bombs in Spanish territory and clearly supporting the Norway-led campaign for an international ban.”

Defence Ministry sources declined to respond to an IPS query of whether the government has any plan to prohibit the manufacturing, sale and possession of cluster bombs.

In response to a question by Congress last year, the government acknowledged that the air force “has a limited arsenal of bombs containing anti-vehicle and anti-runway sub-munitions.”

But in the same response, the Defence Ministry claimed that it had no evidence that this kind of bomb has been used by Spain in any of the international campaigns in which it has taken part. It also reported that it had no plans to acquire or develop cluster bombs.

However, the government purchased 500 Mat-120’s from Instalaza in July

The Spanish army also has BM-330 anti-runway cluster bombs, manufactured in Spain, as well as U.S.-made CBU-100B (Rockeye) bombs.

In its report, Greenpeace states that at least 80 companies in 34 countries have produced, or still produce, cluster bombs or key parts of these weapons.

And today, it says, there are at least 55 companies around the world that manufacture them, nearly half of which are in Europe, and eight in the United States.

The list of producers includes developing countries like Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, Egypt, India, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, South Africa, South Korea and Turkey.

Greenpeace also notes that progress has been made in recent years towards eliminating cluster bombs. One important step in that direction was the 1997 approval of the Ottawa Treaty or Mine Ban Treaty, against land mines.

For her part, González said the most significant step forward was taken by the Belgian parliament this year, when it banned the possession, stockpiling or manufacturing of cluster munitions in Belgian territory. “We hope Spain and other countries will follow suit,” she stressed.