Cluster bomb use deemed to be 'war crime' by UN team

Three international law experts assigned by the UN human rights watchdog to investigate the aftermath of this summer's war in Lebanon said on Dec. 1 that one of their main conclusions is that Israel's use of cluster bombs proves the weapons should be banned. The indiscriminate use of cluster bombs and deliberate attacks on civilians could qualify as war crimes for which Israel could be prosecuted, according to a 153-page report the commission of inquiry presented to the UN Human Rights Council. "We saw the terrible, cruel consequences of the use of those weapons," said Joao Clemente Baena Soares of Brazil. "We think they should be banned. They should be included in the list of weapons that are prohibited by international law." The commission said it found that "the excessive, indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force by the IDF (Israeli Defense Force) goes beyond reasonable arguments of military necessity and of proportionality, and clearly failed to distinguish between civilian and military targets, thus constituting a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law." "In certain cases, such as the deliberate attacks against civilians and civilian properties, attacks against Red Cross ambulances and other protected objects, and the indiscriminate use of cluster munitions, the violations committed by IDF could qualify as serious violations of the laws and customs of war and war crimes," the report said. Ninety percent of the cluster munitions used by the Israelis were fired during the last 72 hours of the conflict, it said and asserted that the weapons were used deliberately to make large areas of fertile agricultural land unusable. Latest estimates are that Israel dropped more than 1 million mini-explosives on Lebanon, it said. The European Union, the United Nations and the international Red Cross have joined in the international outcry against cluster bombs in recent months. The United States, which has supplied Israel with cluster munitions, opposes a ban on the weapons.