US Mission Geneva

The United States is pleased to participate in this 11th conference of High Contracting Parties to Protocol II on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-traps, and Other Devices, as amended in 1996. The United States landmine policy, as announced in 2004, meets or exceeds all of the provisions of Amended Protocol II. Our national report, provided to the Secretariat today, provides updates to our previous reports, primarily related to assistance activities. In addition to our national implementation of the Protocol, we provide a range of humanitarian mine action assistance to countries around the world.

On behalf of the members of my delegation, I would like to join with other delegations in congratulating you on the assumption of your post as President of the Meeting of States Parties. You have our full support.

With respect to cluster munitions, let me confirm today that the United States remains committed to negotiate a legally binding Protocol on Cluster Munitions in the CCW to mitigate the threat to civilian populations resulting from the use of cluster munitions.

We believe that many of the countries participating in this process who have large stockpiles of cluster munitions could agree to a text along the lines of the one before us, and that these countries will live up to the commitments they make. Therefore, we continue to hope that we will be able to reach agreement and realize the humanitarian gains that are within our grasp here.

My delegation is prepared to support an informal meeting to continue our work in the period between now and the Meeting of States Parties in November. However, we think it is very important, if we are going to have such a meeting, that delegations come to it prepared to roll up their sleeves and work toward final compromises on the remaining issues that need to be resolved to reach agreement on a Protocol. There is no sense in having such a meeting if there is no political will to make these necessary compromises.

I would like to start by reiterating my delegation’s strong support for a CCW protocol on cluster munitions that will have a significant humanitarian benefit. In this regard, we welcome the text that you prepared at the end of the last session in February after engaging in extensive consultations during that session.

While we will have some specific comments on the text that you prepared which we will offer at an appropriate time this week, we believe that the text is generally an excellent basis on which to continue our work. We look forward to both formal and informal sessions this week to try to move this process forward.

Mr. President, we must recognize that the CCW has failed this year to achieve its main task – the adoption of a new protocol on cluster munitions. Our failure is all the more disappointing because the opportunity to agree to a protocol that would have had substantial humanitarian benefits was within our grasp. We will have some additional observations on the GGE when its report is considered by this Meeting.

Mr. Chairman, my delegation finds it deeply disappointing that a group of states has blocked progress on this important humanitarian effort because they have remained completely focused on unrealistic results here and have not worked constructively to achieve a balanced, positive result. During the course of the negotiations these last two weeks, and in particular over the last couple of days, it has become clear that further progress in 2008is impossible given this approach by a number of delegations.

We have listened carefully to the argument made by some states that the draft text we are working on here would have no humanitarian benefit. In our view, the appropriate standard by which to judge the adequacy of an eventual protocol is whether it will have a significant humanitarian benefit on the ground.

We have studied the proposals put forward by some of the group of 25. We understand that the ideas expressed in these statements stem from a number of countries’ strongly held view that cluster munitions should be banned completely. My delegation would like to reiterate why a complete ban or a copy of the Oslo Convention is simply not an acceptable approach to my country, and to many other countries in this room.