Cluster bombs release many small bomblets over a wide area, killing many people immediately. Unexploded bomblets can kill or maim long after a conflict has ended.
While all weapons are potentially dangerous to civilians, cluster bombs pose a particular threat for two reasons: they have a wide area of effect, and they consistently leave behind a large number of unexploded bomblets. Unexploded bomblets remain dangerous for decades after the end of a conflict. In Vietnam, people are still being killed as a result of cluster bombs and other objects left by the US and Vietnamese military forces.
That war ended 34 years ago but its effects are still evident – the maiming and killing go on.
Cluster bombs are prohibited under the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which was adopted in Dublin in May 2008 and signed by 94 nations in December 2008 in Oslo. The United States has not signed.
Cluster bombs have been used by
- Russia, in Chechnya, 1995
- NATO, in Yugoslavia, 1999
- Russia, in Chechnya, 1999
- United States, in Afghanistan, 2001
- United States, in Iraq, 2003 . . .
- Israel, in Lebanon, 2006
- Hezbollah, in Lebanon, 2006
Call your senators through the Capitol switchboard, 202-224-3121. Don’t know who your senators are? Find and contact your elected officials via http://www.congress.org/congressorg/home/
Senators from New York: Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand.
Ask them: Please cosponsor* S 416 – “A BILL TO LIMIT THE USE OF CLUSTER MUNITIONS”
In Peace Always
– The Legislative Committee of the Granny Peace Brigade
As of April 2, 20009 23 senators had cosponsored this bill. They deserve our thanks as does the sponsor of the bill Dianne Feinstein.
Cosponsosrs:
Bingaman, Jeff [NM]
Boxer, Barbara [CA]
Brown, Sherrod [OH]
Byrd, Robert C. [WV]
Cantwell, Maria [WA]
Cardin, Benjamin L. [MD]
Casey, Robert P., Jr. [PA]
Collins, Susan M.
Durbin, Richard [IL]
Feingold, Russell D. [WI]
Harkin, Tom [IA]
Johnson, Tim [SD]
Kennedy, Edward M. [MA]
Leahy, Patrick J. [VT]
Menendez, Robert [NJ]
Merkley, Jeff [OR]
Mikulski, Barbara A. [MD]
Murray, Patty [WA]
Sanders, Bernard [VT]
Snowe, Olympia J.
Stabenow, Debbie [MI]
Whitehouse, Sheldon [RI]
Sen Wyden, Ron [OR]
Granny Peace Brigade 