Billy Timmins (Wicklow, Fine Gael)

I welcome the Bill. Members will remember that earlier this year I introduced a Private Members' Bill on cluster munitions. I regret that the Minister's predecessor was not magnanimous enough to accept the Bill. It was no different from this Bill, except that it went a little further. I cannot understand why the Minister refused to accept it. I welcome that the Title of the Bill has been changed from the Inhumane Munitions Bill to Cluster Munitions and Anti-Personnel Mines Bill. The original Title sent out a strange message.

Changes are required to strengthen this Bill but I support the principles behind the Bill. I regret that the Government has not published the provision to prohibit investment by a State body in any producer of cluster munitions or anti-personnel mines. Fine Gael will bring an amendment to this effect on Committee Stage. The Minister referred to the Government bringing forward such an amendment and referred to its complexity. This issue was well-flagged and, while I do not want to have a go at the Minister's predecessor, he made a big play of the fact that the Government would bring forward this measure, notwithstanding that he did not support our Bill on the night. It is unacceptable that such a measure is not included in this Bill, which is being introduced six months after our Bill, and given that this measure was well flagged. It cannot have been that difficult to have included it. The blame probably lies with the Department of Finance and perhaps that tells its own story.

The urgency to deal with this issue was shown by the Government only a few months ago. We all applauded when the Dublin Convention was agreed, but since then and since I introduced my Bill on this issue last April, we have seen yet another war in which cluster munitions were used. Last August Russia and Georgia fought a war over South Ossetia. Now is not the time to discuss the rights and wrongs of that war, who started it, who provoked it or who caused it, but both countries are guilty of the crime — in my view it is a crime — of using cluster munitions. Russia denied it, but Human Rights Watch, an organisation that has been an outspoken campaigner against cluster munitions, is convinced, based on evidence, that both countries used them. Georgia has admitted to doing so, but it insists that its cluster bombs contained a self-destruct mechanism to make them inoperable after the war.

We know from past wars elsewhere that these mechanisms do not work in all cases. At least 10% of those cluster munitions, even if they are designed to cease to be live, still remain live. While we remember the South Ossetia War as being in 2008, there is every likelihood that in 2009, 2010, 2018 and perhaps in 100 years' time people, many of them children, will still be killed by the cluster bombs dropped in 2008.

Last night the BBC broadcast a programme on the First World War. Most of us think of the First World War as having ended in 1918, but it turns out that in 2008, 90 years after the end of that war, people are still being killed by unexploded bombs that were fired in that war. What was termed "The war to end all wars" keeps on killing.

Prior to the First World War, the British artillery based here continuously fired munitions in the Glen of Imaal in Wicklow over a period of three or four weeks in preparation for the war and in respect of those munitions fired there was a one third failure rate. Many of them are to be found unexploded in the military ranges in the Glen of Imaal. I do not believe we will ever be in a position to clear them, but it is important that the safety guidelines and notices warning of them in that area are constantly reviewed. A tragedy occurred in the late 1970s when some young children were killed when they picked up an unexploded mortar bomb.

The First World War bombs that have exploded are not cluster munitions but the remnants of the normal artillery of the day. They are far less dangerous, far less widespread and far less of a threat than cluster munitions, but they are still killing. If 90 years after the end of that war, deaths continue to occur, for how many decades, maybe centuries, will people in South Ossetia be killed by cluster munitions? Will Deputies in this House a century from now be reading of young South Ossetians being killed by cluster bombs dropped in 2008?

We know that cluster munitions kill for generations after a war ends. The Laos civil war ended in 1975, but people were still being killed this year, perhaps this very day, in Laos, thanks to the cluster munitions used in that war. Cluster munitions used in the Second World War and in Vietnam are still killing.

If cluster bombs had existed in the early 1920s and had been used during our War of Independence, we would have members of our own families being killed by them still. That illustrates how dangerous they are. They kill long after the war they were used in has been forgotten, long after it has been confined to the history books, long after everyone who was alive at the time of the war and those who fought in the war has died. Cluster munitions are almost literally a war without end.

The first cluster bombs were made by Germany and dropped during the Second World War in Grimsby, as the Minister outlined. Other states copied the technology and developed it, producing carnage in country after country. In the 1960s the United States used cluster bombs in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. France used them in Chad in the 1960s. The United States used them in Iraq and Kuwait in 1991. Russia used them in Chechnya in the 1990s while the Sudanese Government used them against the Sudanese People's Liberation Army. Up to the end of the last century, in 1999, the United States, Britain and the Netherlands used them in Kosovo. They continue to be used in this century and not only in South Ossetia. In the current Iraq war, the US military used them. Only two years ago the Israelis used them in Lebanon.

I will cite an example from one war on the record. Globalsecurity.org indicates that, "According to the UN Mine Action Co-ordination Centre (UNMACC) in Pristina, the total number of mines and UXO (unexploded ordinances) cleared by 8 March 2001 [in Kosovo] was assessed at [more than 84,000]" — more than 84,000 in one country in one war. They were not all cluster munitions but many of them were. How many people, including children, have been or will be killed by those 84,000 unexploded bombs? When were they or will they be killed? This year? This decade? This century?

Let us not forget how cluster munitions kill. Fragments of exploding munitions travel at high velocity. When they strike they set off pressure waves within the body, with those pressure waves and the fragments and projectiles doing horrific damage to soft tissue and organs. Even a single fragment can rupture the spleen or cause the intestines to implode. If a victim survives the incident, and needless to say many will not, they may suffer from a variety of injuries, including loss of limbs, burns, puncture wounds, ruptured eardrums, blindness, or all of those and other injuries. Many of those who survive speak of wishing they had not, such is the horrific nature of their injuries.

Anton Antonowicz reported in the Daily Mirror that:

Among the 168 patients I counted [in a hospital], not one was being treated for bullet wounds. All of them, men, women, children, bore the wounds of bomb shrapnel. It peppered their bodies. Blackened the skin. Smashed heads. Tore limbs. A doctor reported that "All the injuries you see were caused by cluster bombs ... The majority of the victims were children who died because they were outside".

That is what those who use cluster munitions inflict on victims, and why those weapons must be banned by every country on every continent forever.

I want to pay tribute to the work of the Government in the Dublin conference, which produced the treaty to ban cluster munitions. In particular, I compliment the Minister, Deputy Martin, and his staff in the Department of Foreign Affairs on the excellent work they did. Ireland and the other countries in the core group of the Oslo Process, namely, Austria, the Holy See, Mexico, New Zealand, Norway and Peru, did humanity some service in helping to deliver this treaty and deserve praise for that. Those countries who assembled in Croke Park for the conference delivered one of the most significant advances for humanity in this century so far.

I also pay tribute to a number of Irish newspapers, in particular The Star, which ran a vigorous campaign on the issue and helped inform Irish people of the horrors of cluster munitions and campaigned to see their use ended. Those campaigns will have helped save lives and will have kept the issue alive in the minds of the public. They deserve our thanks.

I pay a special tribute to one world leader, Britain's Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. Britain, like many other states, fought for years to prevent this deal and refused to join it, but Gordon Brown this year over-ruled his advisers and his military, to commit Britain to abandoning the use of those weapons. That was the act of real leadership and deserves to be acknowledged.

Today, on 4 November, millions of people in the United States are going to the polls to elect the next US president. Two honourable men, Senators Obama and McCain, have fought a remarkable campaign. We will know tonight which one of them will win the race for the White House. For eight years the presidency of George Bush has resisted attempts to restrict and ban these weapons, albeit by allowing a one year ban to come into place, which is due to end in late December. I appeal to the new president, whether it is Senator Obama or Senator McCain, to follow Gordon Brown's lead and take a principled stand against these evil weapons. Senator McCain, to his credit, broke with President Bush and with his party on the issue of the use of torture, calling for it to be halted in all cases. Whether today sees the election of Senator Obama or Senator McCain as president, I hope we will see the election of a president who will take a principled stand on cluster munitions by telling the US military that they can no longer ever be used. I ask the Government to raise this issue directly with the new US president.

Fine Gael also urges the Government to raise with Russia, China, Israel, India and Pakistan their refusal to agree to the treaty ban on cluster munitions. We must not mince our words in putting on the record the unacceptability of their behaviour. Under Article 85 of the Geneva Conventions, it is a war crime to launch "an indiscriminate attack affecting the civilian population in the knowledge that such an attack will cause an excessive loss of life or injury to civilians". Under the Hague Conventions, Articles 22 and 23 state that, "The right of belligerents to adopt means of injuring the enemy is not unlimited," and that "It is especially forbidden to kill treacherously individuals belonging to the hostile nation or army". I cannot see how the use of cluster bombs can be viewed as other than a war crime and any leader who authorises their use as other than a war criminal.

I have not focused on the fact that the Bill also deals with anti-personnel mines, but I warmly welcome this inclusion. I do not know why this is only featuring in legislation in 2008 when we signed the treaty in 1997. Will the Minister clarify the reasons for the delay? However, it is a welcome, if belated, step. The fact that the Bill deals with two of the most gruesome and morally reprehensible weapons ever invented, cluster munitions and landmines, makes the legislation one of the most important enactments we have had to deal with here.

The Minister has dealt with the various sections, which are relatively straightforward. Everybody in the House supports the banning of cluster munitions which are reprehensible and indiscriminate weapons. They do not distinguish between friend and foe, or between child and adult. The implications of such weapons continue for many years after the conflict occurs. When I served in Lebanon, I often met children with one arm or one leg missing caused by playing with something that to them appeared attractive. Very often these munitions are disguised as attractive items basically to strike terror into a population.

Section 7(4) deals with the issue of interoperability. Fine Gael supports this measure. We believe it is necessary in order to enable us to participate in peacekeeping operations. I would hope that in time this section will become redundant. I am not aware if Defence Forces personnel have ever operated in a situation where cluster munitions were used by a friendly force. I would not imagine this to be the case. I know they have operated in several areas where they are a threat and one part of their missions is often to clear up such areas. If the Bill did not provide for that measure our peacekeeping, as we know it today, would come to an end. It would not be possible for us to carry out peacekeeping operations if we prohibited Irish forces from serving with personnel from countries that were not signatories to the convention, or that used these munitions or had them in stores. I would hope that with the passing of time this section of the Bill will become redundant. Much depends on the approach of the incoming President of the United States of America. I hope this will be a step that country will take.

The Bill contains no provision for applying a cost on the offender for the destruction of cluster munitions and rather requires them to be delivered to the Defence Forces for their destruction. I ask the Minister to review this provision. Fine Gael will table an amendment requiring the offender, the guilty party, to pay the cost of the destruction of the munitions.

We will also table an amendment to prevent State companies investing in companies that manufacture or are involved in the production or otherwise of such munitions. During the debate on the Fine Gael Private Members' Bill, we dealt with the issue of financial institutions producing the annual reports on companies involved in their manufacture. We may also revisit that matter.

I welcome the Bill and our party will do all we can to facilitate it so that it can all be in order by the time the signature is required, which I believe is sometime in December. I wish the Minister well and thank his officials for their work on the Bill.

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