Singabloodypore

ABC Radio Australia

Singapore has announced it will NOT sign up to an international ban on cluster bombs that's being finalised in Norway this week, but says it WILL stop exporting the weapons. More than one hundred other countries have said they will sign the treaty, but the major producers and users of the bombs, the US, China and Russia have refused to come on board.

Presenter: Liam Cochrane
Speaker: Thomas Nash, coordinator of the Cluster Munitions Coalition; Sinappa Samydorai, president of Think Center, a Singapore based human rights think tank.

Listen: Windows Media

COCHRANE: In rural Cambodia, the tennis-ball-sized bomblets which spew out of a cluster bomb are sought-after for scrap metal. Thousands were scattered by US bombing missions during the Vietnam war. But many bomblets remain volatile for decades and end up taking the limbs and lives of Cambodian children and scrap metal scavengers a risk taken by these Cambodian men cutting into a large bomb shell in the documentary 'Bombhunters'.

SFX - sawing

COCHRANE: Their nervousness shows as the hacksaw blade snaps.

SFX - sawing and talking in Khmer

COCHRANE: Cluster bombs have killed around 100-thousand civilians since the Sixties, a quarter of the victims children. So the signing of an international ban on the devices this week has been hailed as a major breakthrough, one of the first times in history an entire category of weapon has been outlawed. But, just as important are those who say they will not sign - a list which includes the major producers and users of the bombs: the US, China, Russia and Singapore, among others. Thomas Nash is the coordinator of the Cluster Munitions Coalition.

NASH: "Well, we are very disappointed that Singapore has decided not to sign this treaty here in Oslo. Of course they can still sign in the future, but really Singapore has no good reason not to sign. Many of their neighbours in the region will be signing up for this treaty and this is a weapon that is going to be widely stigmatised around the world, so it's really time to give it up."

COCHRANE: Sinappa Samydorai is the president of Think Center, a Singaporean-based human rights think tank.

SAMYDORAI: "I think the mind set is more a seige mentality, keeping all options for defence, that means any weapon goes."

COCHRANE: Mr Samydorai says Singapore's decision not to sign up to the International Criminal Court and its resistance against campaigns to abolish the death penalty show a pattern of not bowing to political pressure. And, as with these issues, he says the stance of other large nations on cluster bombs will influence Singapore's policy.

SAMYDORAI: "Oh obviously, if the big countries like the US and China and India are not signing the Ottawa treaty was also not signed, I think the ICC was also not signed by Britain so similarly if huge countries like that which have a bigger impact on the international market have no influence based on this treaty, I think Singapore will go along with them."

COCHRANE: But there is some good news for those trying to get rid of cluster bombs. Singapore has announced a moratorium on the export of cluster munitions it has stockpiled. It's not clear how many cluster bombs Singapore currently has, but Thomas Nash says the decision is a move in the right direction.

NASH: "We're not even sure that Singapore is actively producing cluster bombs at the moment. We do know that they are offered for export by the Singaporean military industry so its very welcome that they are now saying they will no longer offer them for export."

COHRANE: Mr Nash says interim measures like Singapore's moratorium, suggest the strategy of international stigma against cluster bomb users is working. Cluster munitions were most recently used by Russia and Georgia earlier this year but, significantly, NATO forces decided not to use them in Afghanistan. Thomas Nash.

NASH: "What I think it shows is the power of this norm that is being established by the treaty signature here in Oslo is going to start to bite, is going to have an affect on even those countries that don't join, and this extends even to some of the big players such as the US, China and so on. They are simply going to understand that you cannot trade in this weapon, you cannot ever use this weapon, this weapon is going to be a thing of the past."