US Congress Bans Cluster Bomb Exports

In a major turnaround in US policy, new legislation signed into law by President Obama on March 11 permanently bans nearly all cluster bomb exports by the United States. Human Rights Watch provided information to senators and worked closely with Senator Patrick Leahy, who secured the export ban. The ban was first enacted in a similar budget bill in December 2007, but that law mandated it for only one year. The new legislation makes the ban permanent. The legislation states that cluster munitions can only be exported if they leave behind less than 1 percent of their submunitions as duds and also requires the receiving country to agree that cluster munitions "will not be used where civilians are known to be present." Cluster munitions often fail to explode on initial impact, leaving duds that act like landmines and kill and maim civilians long after a war ends. Human Rights Watch is working in coalition with many other organizations to promote legislation that would prohibit not only the export of the weapons but their use by the US military.