David Norris (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate that. I have come to Seanad Éireann to raise the question of cluster bombs. This is particularly appropriate since the Convention on Cluster Munitions, effectively banning them, was signed in Dublin in May 2008. Figures in 2018 show that more than 21,000 people have been either killed or injured by these vicious weapons. A large percentage of these people were children, and this is the especially vicious, filthy and nasty thing about cluster bombs. When they break up in mid-air, the cluster bombs land and look like toys, and I think this is done deliberately. Children pick them up and then they are killed or maimed, and it is a shocking thing. Some 123 countries have decided to ban the use of cluster bombs entirely, and I welcome this. The use of cluster bombs amounts to state terrorism. It takes us back to the era of extraordinary rendition and waterboarding. I am a strong supporter of President Zelenskyy and I call on him to reject the use of cluster bombs and to refuse delivery of these vicious and inappropriate weapons.