Big Cluster Bomb Users Join Talks -- Swiss Info
GENEVA (Reuters) - Talks to tighten rules on cluster bombs that resumed in Geneva on Monday are simply a distraction from a separate treaty to ban the weapons entirely that is being boycotted by major powers, campaigners said.
Over 100 countries agreed in May to ban cluster munitions -- which campaigners say have killed or maimed tens of thousands of civilians -- and are due to sign a treaty in Oslo next month.
But major producers or users of cluster munitions, including the United States, Russia, China, India, Brazil and Israel, oppose banning the weapons and have not adopted that agreement.
Stephen Mathias, who heads the U.S. delegation to the Geneva talks on updating a 1981 convention on exceptionally dangerous conventional weapons (CCW), said countries had fundamentally different views on cluster munitions.
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My Comment: A lot of wishful thinking at work here.