Policy

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan has not acceded to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.

Jordan is not known to have made any statements on the ban convention in 2013 or the first half of 2014. Previously, in September 2012, Jordan’s Prince Mired Ben Raad Zeid al-Hussein informed States Parties that “We realize and appreciate the importance of the Convention on Cluster Munitions even though we are not yet a State Party. Hopefully circumstances will change some time in the not too distant future and we will be able to join.”[1] Mired, who serves as special envoy for the Mine Ban Treaty, informed States Parties in November 2010, that Jordan will continue to support the convention “from the sidelines,” but said, “we have yet to decide if and when we can join.”[2]

Jordan participated in two meetings of the Oslo Process that created the Convention on Cluster Munitions, but did not attend the formal negotiations in Dublin in May 2008, even as an observer.[3]

Jordan has continued to show interest in the ban convention. It participated in an international conference on cluster munitions in Santiago, Chile in June 2010 and has attended every Meeting of States Parties of the convention as an observer, except the Fourth Meeting of States Parties in Lusaka, Zambia in September 2013. Jordan has never participated in the convention’s intersessional meetings in Geneva, such as those held in April 2014.

Jordan voted in favor of UN General Assembly (UNGA) Resolution 68/182 on 18 December 2013, which expressed “outrage” at the Syrian government’s “continued widespread and systematic gross violations of human rights…including those involving the use of…cluster munitions.”[4]

Jordan is a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty. Jordan is party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons.

Use, production, transfer, and stockpiling

Jordan is not known to have used or produced cluster munitions, but it has imported the weapons. The current status and content of Jordan’s stockpile of cluster munitions is not known.

The United States (US) transferred 31,704 artillery projectiles (M509A1, M483) containing more than 3 million dual-purpose improved conventional munition (DPICM) submunitions to Jordan in 1995.[5] According to US export records, Jordan also imported 200 CBU-71 and 150 Rockeye cluster bombs at some point between 1970 and 1995.[6] Jordan is also reported to possess the Hydra-70 air-to-surface unguided rocket system, but it is not known if the ammunition types available to it include the M261 Multi-Purpose Submunition rocket.[7]

Contamination and Impact

Overall Mine Action Performance: AVERAGE[1]

Mines

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan is contaminated by mines and explosive remnants of war (ERW). Contamination is the result primarily of the 1948 partition of Palestine, the 1967 Arab-Israeli conflict, the 1970 civil war, and the 1975 confrontation with Syria. Military training ranges and cross-border smuggling have added to the ERW problem.

Jordan announced it had completed clearance of all known mined areas on 24 April 2012 after Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA) finished clearance of the mine belt along its northern border with Syria the previous month, but subsequently acknowledged that not all mines along the border had been accounted for.[2] In fact, Jordan appears to still contain mined areas on its territory that fall within the obligation under Article 5 to clear all antipersonnel mines in mined areas under a State Party’s jurisdiction or control.

NPA was due to check some 10.5km² of land adjacent to the mine belt for close to 9,000 mines from the mine belts unaccounted for and which may have been removed during unrecorded army clearance operations or by smugglers, or may have shifted due to weather, floods, or land erosion.[3] When operations halted in February 2013 due to security issues on the northern border, NPA had completed work on 8.2km², leaving 2.3km² to be verified, while the National Committee for Demining and Rehabilitation (NCDR) had inspected 6.8km².[4]

Jordan is also continuing verification and clearance in the Jordan Valley. The army’s Royal Engineering Corps (REC) cleared the area and declared completion in 2008, but the NCDR concluded that operations had not met national standards and clearance operations in 2013 alone found 241 mines, including 218 antipersonnel mines. The total “project area” was 15.6km² and as of May 2014 a total of 5.4km² remained to be addressed.[5]

Jordan Valley Sampling and Verification Project in 2013[6]

Cluster munition remnants

Jordan may have some cluster munition remnants in remote areas, the result of the armed forces testing cluster munitions on firing ranges, but the NCDR has said any contamination is unlikely to be extensive.[7] A NATO-funded ERW survey initiated in September 2008 had recorded no cluster munition remnants as of end 2011.[8] The NCDR sees the main risk of submunitions to be resulting from imports of scrap metal from Iraq. The only submunition found since 2010 was at a northeastern checkpoint where it appeared to have been imported with scrap from Iraq.[9]

Mine Action Program

Jordan established the NCDR as “the primary national mine action authority” under a 2000 law, while an April 2002 royal decree appointed its board of directors, which includes representatives of the Jordanian Armed Forces, the government, NGOs, landmine survivors, and the media. The NCDR became fully operational in 2004 when Prince Mired Raad Zeid al-Hussein became its chair.[10]

The NCDR was responsible for preparing and overseeing implementation of a national mine action plan and for ensuring that mine action is integrated into the country’s wider development strategies.[11] It is responsible for coordinating, accrediting, regulating, and quality-assuring all mine action organizations as well as for fundraising.[12]

Strategic planning

The NCDR’s 2010–2015 National Plan, published in June 2010, aimed to complete clearance of all known mines, including 65,000 mines from the northern border, by May 2012, and to clear all ERW by December 2012.[13] It is unclear if this target will be attained by 2015.

Land Release

NPA expected to complete verification of the northern border by the end of June 2013 but was able to work only until mid-February 2013, when security issues related to the conflict in Syria brought operations to a halt. In January and February, it verified 460,000m², destroying in the process 20 antipersonnel mines and one antivehicle mine.[14] At the time operations ceased, some 2.3km² remained to be verified.[15]

Army engineers continued verification and sampling in the Jordan Valley, releasing about 1km² in 2013, about half the amount of the previous year, and destroying about one-third fewer antipersonnel mines.[16] In May and June, NPA also supported the Jordan Valley sampling and verification project but in the aftermath of Jordan’s announcement that it had completed clearance of all known mined areas, NPA was unable to attract donor funding and ended its Jordan program. NPA decided to keep its office in Amman open to provide regional administrative and logistical support until the end of 2014.[17]

Jordan Valley Project

Article 5 Compliance

Jordan officially declared completion of its Article 5 obligations on 24 April 2012, just ahead of its 1 May 2012 treaty deadline set as a result of the three-year extension granted by States Parties in 2008. It submitted its formal declaration of completion to the Twelfth Meeting of States Parties in Geneva in December 2012.[18]

Jordan’s announcement came after NPA completed demining of minefields along the northern border with Syria. Announcing completion, however, Prince Mired acknowledged that “a residual risk could remain in areas where landmines have been emplaced.”[19] Jordan has subsequently noted that completion of northern border verification will depend on security conditions. At the 2013 Standing Committee meetings, Jordan said it expected Jordan Valley verification efforts on the remaining 4.4km² to last two more years.[20] Since then, new information leading to a higher estimate of area requiring verification as of the end of 2013 makes it appear that Jordan will need more time to complete work in the area.

Given the obligation in Article 5(1) to destroy all antipersonnel mines in mined areas, Jordan still has outstanding Article 5 survey and clearance obligations to fulfill, in particular in the Jordan Valley.

Recommendations

Jordan should identify the time needed to complete full clearance of contaminated areas in the Jordan Valley and request a new extension to its Article 5 deadline for this period.

In light of the closure of NPA’s program, Jordan should clarify how verification of the north border will be concluded.

Victim assistance commitments

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan is responsible for a significant number of landmine and explosive remnants of war (ERW) survivors who are in need. Jordan has made commitments to provide victim assistance through the Mine Ban Treaty.

Casualties Overview

The National Committee for Demining and Rehabilitation (NCDR) recorded no new mine/explosive remnants of war (ERW) casualties in Jordan.[1] The last known casualties in Jordan were in 2011 when six casualties were recorded.[2]

Compared to 2006–2009, the number of casualties caused by mine/ERW greatly decreased in 2010 and 2011.[3]

The NCDR recorded 950 mine/ERW casualties (122 killed; 799 injured; 29 unknown) between 1948 and December 2013.[4]

Victim Assistance

The total number of recorded mine/ERW survivors in Jordan is 799.

Victim assistance coordination

In May 2013, NCDR began a victim needs assessment survey to assist with planning of victim assistance interventions in future.[5]

The Higher Council for the Affairs of People with Disabilities (HCD) is the national focal point on victim assistance.[6] Victim assistance is coordinated through the Steering Committee on Survivor and Victim Assistance, chaired by the HCD, which includes governmental and non-governmental representatives as well as survivors. The HCD also serves as the focal point for the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD).[7] Victim assistance is included in the National Mine Action Plan 2010–2015.[8]

National victim assistance standards drafted by NCDR that outlined the roles and responsibilities of all victim assistance partners in Jordan, as well as prosthetic and orthotic standards,[9] were not finalized in 2013.[10] Victim assistance is also integrated into the National Disability Strategy.[11]

Service accessibility and effectiveness

In 2013, Jordan took steps toward fulfilling its victim assistance commitments by increasing the availability of physical rehabilitation and economic reintegration opportunities. However, limited funding made the provision of new services difficult.[12]

NCDR advocated for the provision of equitable medical and rehabilitation services for both civilian and military survivors. In an effort to address the disparity in services between military and civilian survivors,[13] a victim assistance capacity-building project for the northern region of Jordan launched in September 2011.[14] As part of this project, in 2013 the NCDR continued to support the prosthetic and orthotic center at the Princess Basma Hospital in Irbid established by the NCDR with financial support through the Polus Center in 2012.[15] In 2013, with financial support from the government of Canada, the NCDR provided additional equipment and materials to the center, which serves civilian mine/ERW survivors and other persons with disabilities.[16] Several workshops were also organized in 2013 to train prosthetics and orthotic technicians of the center.[17]

NCDR continued its economic reintegration project in collaboration with the Jordan Agricultural Credit Corporation[18] : 60 survivors received micro-credit loans to establish income-generating projects, which was more than double the number from the previous year.[19] LLCR also provided training, rehabilitation, and activities for confidence-building and social reintegration in remote areas.[20] In 2014, NCDR planned to reach at least an additional 10 survivors through the income-generating program.[21]

The 2007 law on the rights of persons with disabilities generally provides equal rights to persons with disabilities, but such legal protections were not upheld. Furthermore, it still lacked regulations to support its implementation. In 2013, persons with disabilities continued to face problems in obtaining employment and accessing education, healthcare, transportation, and other services, particularly in rural areas.[22] In 2013, the government endorsed instructions giving tariff exemptions for the vehicles of persons with disabilities and reduced the costs of hiring domestic help for persons with disabilities. Approximately 10,000 persons with disabilities (some 17% of the total estimated population with disabilities) benefited from these measures.[23]

Jordan ratified the CRPD in March 2008.

In 2012, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan contributed US$3,500,000 toward its mine action program, as it has done each year since 2005.[1] This national contribution represented 44% of total mine action contributions in 2012.

International contributions in 2012 towards mine action in Jordan totaled $4,440,137. Australia, Norway, and the United States (US) each contributed over $1 million.[2]

International contributions: 2012[3]

Summary of contributions: 2008-2012[4]