Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)

My question did not confine itself to the convention banning the use of chemical weapons. White phosphorous is an incendiary weapon. As the Minister pointed out, under Article 2 of Protocol III of the 1980 UN Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons it is specifically banned in areas where there are civilians. The basis for my tabling this question was the suggestion in the first instance that it had been used simply for illumination and then that it had been used against military combatants. In neither of those early statements was reference made to the fact that it had been used adjacent to civilians.

Frankly, it is extremely clear that it is not correct to say that white phosphorous never falls within the Chemical Weapons Convention. By definition, if white phosphorous is used against civilians or close to them, it falls within the convention's ambit. In other words, it depends on the manner of its use. Regarding how it was used, we got a straightforward denial followed by a qualified statement that it had been used for illumination. Then came a suggestion that it had been used for military purposes, and we had a string of denials that it had been used in Falluja, a town of 300,000 people where no effort had been made to ensure that the civilian population would not be affected. That is the reason for my question. It is incredible to think that white phosphorous, which burns on a person's skin and continues to burn, and which can be released into wounds and so forth, should have been used in such conditions in a civilian area.

If that is the kind of statement that we get on white phosphorous in Iraq, how can the Minister unconditionally accept such assurances as he receives on other matters?

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