It is being discussed. The Anti-Personnel Mine Ban convention meanwhile has issued the following statement:
26 November 2024: Statement Regarding the Possible Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines to a State Party to the Convention
In the 25 years since the Convention entered into force, this landmark humanitarian disarmament treaty had never faced such a challenge to its integrity.
The announcement by the United States (US) – not a member of the Convention – on the transfer of “non-persistent anti-personnel landmines” (https://www.state.gov/the-united-states-announces-significant-new-military-assistance-for-ukraine-2/), is a radical departure from the United States’ 30-year de facto “anti-personnel landmine policy”.
Article 1 of the Convention stipulates that “Each State Party undertakes never under any circumstances use, develop, produce, otherwise acquire, stockpile, retain or transfer to anyone, directly or indirectly, anti-personnel mines; or assist, encourage or induce, in any way, anyone to engage in any activity prohibited to a State Party under this Convention.”
Article 2 establishes that “an anti-personnel mine [is] one designed to be exploded by the presence, proximity or contact of a person and that will incapacitate, injure or kill one or more persons.”
In its understanding and application, the Convention does not distinguish on the nature of the weapon, whether it is improvised or self-deactivates. The States Parties have agreed that if it fits the definition of an anti-personnel mine as stipulated in Article 2, it is considered an anti-personnel mine and therefore prohibited to a State Party.
Receipt of a prohibited weapon would be a direct violation of the treaty by a State Party.
On this, some delegations to the Siem Reap-Angkor Summit on a Mine-Free World taking place in Cambodia until 29 November, have expressed their concern, noting that it does not matter how they are produced or why they are used (as there are no exceptions on their use) – any use or transfer by States not party to the Convention does not diminish or revoke the obligation of a State Party to uphold its commitments and obligations under the treaty.
All States that have joined have accepted to be bound by these conditions – no exceptions.
While the Ukraine President has acknowledged that Ukraine will receive “essential mines”, the Ukrainian delegation attending the Summit has not yet informed on this development (https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1859313020641366485). Ukraine has consistently expressed its commitment to the Convention’s norms, even in the face of unprecedented challenges posed by ongoing conflict.
The Convention has helped establish a strong norm against the use of these weapons – this is reflected by a number of States not party routinely voting in favour of the UN Resolution for the implementation of the Convention. Therefore, any action that challenges this norm is being and should be addressed by the States Parties at the Summit, which is a critical multilateral forum to reaffirm commitments to the principles and objectives of this instrument of international humanitarian law.
The Convention community must remain united in its resolve to uphold the Convention’s norms and principles. This means working collaboratively to address compliance, reaffirming commitments to mine clearance, victim assistance, and mine risk education, and strengthening efforts to universalize the treaty and its norm at the Summit and beyond.
It is important to recall that any use of anti-personnel mines today – anywhere in the world and under any circumstances – will perpetuate suffering for generations and decades to come. These weapons will continue killing and maiming civilians including farmers and children in times of peace. It will be the affected communities which will bear the brunt and pay the heftiest price. Clearing new use will also require substantial resources and place other lives at risk including of those who will have to carry out the dangerous job to remove these weapons from the ground.
In the words of one of the Convention’s greatest champions – Dr Cornelio Sommaruga, the then-President of the International Committee of the Red Cross who died earlier this year,
“World’s governments must now prepare for the ‘long road ahead’, as the daunting challenges of mine clearance and the provision of adequate assistance to all mine victims still have to be addressed. We have learned from the case of landmines that it is both easier and faster to distribute arms than to teach the principles of humanitarian law to those who possess them. If we fail to learn from our mistakes, we are doomed to repeat them”. (Ottawa, 3 December 1997)
... the motivation for the Ottawa Treaty was their lethality years after the end of conflicts and resulting deaths and maiming of civilians. This, cautiously, would not seem to be the case here.
While you are right that the mines are better designed to be demined in the future, I have to point out how all this is still hypocritical.
From a military perspective, there is no doubt that these weapons can help Ukraine impede Russia's recent advancement / incursion into Ukraine due to their revised tactics - :
“What we've seen most recently is because the Russians have been so unsuccessful in the way that they have been fighting, they've kind of changed their tactics a bit, and they don't lead with their mechanized forces anymore. They lead with the dismounted forces who are able to close and do things to kind of pave the way for mechanized forces,” ...
Thus, Ukranian forces can now use these deadly anti-personnels mines to maim or kill the advancing Russian army on foot, making every such incursion a very deadly affair for the Russian army. This would also force the Russians to pause and refine their tactics.
But, as far as the US is considered, let us recognize that this is another hypocritical demonstration of US policy.
In 2022, the Biden administration rolled back a 2020 Trump-era policy and prohibited the supply and use of anti-personnel mines. They also used this opportunity to claim the "moral" high ground against Russia:
“Neither of these indiscriminate weapons, the horrific consequences of which we are seeing in Ukraine today, belong in the arsenals of civilized nations,” ... Biden administration officials took the opportunity to condemn Russia’s use of land mines in Ukraine, where the munitions “have caused extensive harm to civilians and civilian objects,” Adrienne Watson, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said in a statement on Tuesday.
(This kind of flip-flopping of policy, and "might is right" behaviour of the Americans and Russians to push foreign policies whenever it suits their own political interests, is what makes many of us in the "Global South" cynical of superpower politics.)
