Commitment to the Convention on Cluster Munitions

Policy

The Republic of Uganda signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008.

In May 2012, Uganda said that political changes following national elections held in 2011 had delayed ratification of the convention, but reiterated its hope to ratify by the convention’s Third Meeting of States Parties in September 2012.[1] In September 2011, Uganda informed States Parties that a Cabinet memorandum had been prepared which recommended ratification of the convention.[2]

In September 2011, Uganda stated that national implementation legislation for the Convention on Cluster Munitions is being prepared for consideration after ratification.[3]

Uganda participated extensively in the Oslo Process that produced the Convention on Cluster Munitions and hosted a regional meeting on cluster munitions in Kampala in September 2008 that helped encourage African states to sign the convention. Uganda continued to actively engage in the work of the convention in 2011 and the first half of 2012. It attended the convention’s Second Meeting of States Parties in Beirut, Lebanon in September 2011, where it provided an update on ratification. Uganda participated in intersessional meetings of the convention in Geneva in June 2011 and April 2012.

Uganda attended the Accra Regional Conference on the Universalization of the Convention on Cluster Munitions in May 2012, where it gave statements on universalization and victim assistance. At the conference, Uganda endorsed the Accra Universalization Action Plan, which among other actions, encourages states not party to the convention to “take all necessary steps” to ratify by the convention’s Third Meeting of States Parties in September 2012.

Uganda is a party to the Mine Ban Treaty.

Convention on Conventional Weapons

Uganda is a party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW).

At the CCW’s Fourth Review Conference in November 2011, Uganda did not make any comments on the chair’s draft text of the proposed CCW protocol on cluster munitions. However, on the final day of the conference, Uganda was one of 50 countries that issued a joint statement declaring that there was no consensus on the draft protocol and that it did not address fundamental humanitarian concerns.[4]

The Review Conference ended without reaching agreement on the draft protocol, thus concluding the CCW’s work on cluster munitions.

Use, production, transfer, and stockpiling

In April 2012, Uganda made an intervention during an intersessional meeting on stockpile destruction to assert that “Uganda has never manufactured, acquired, stockpiled, transferred or used cluster munitions.”[5] In September 2011, Uganda stated that it has never used, produced, transferred, or acquired cluster munitions.[6] Previously, in June 2009, a senior official said that Uganda does not have any stockpiled cluster munitions.[7]

Human Rights Watch and the CMC have listed Uganda as a stockpiler of cluster munitions, based on statements by government officials and on the clearance of cluster munition remnants and explosive submunitions.[8] In addition, Uganda possesses Grad 122mm surface-to-surface rocket launchers, which have the capability to deliver rockets with submunitions.[9]

Cluster munitions were apparently used in the fighting in northern Uganda between the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) and the Uganda People’s Defence Forces, but it is not clear who used the cluster munitions or precisely when or how many were used. On several occasions, Uganda has denied that its armed forces used cluster munitions and said the LRA was responsible.[10] The Ugandan Mine Action Centre (UMAC) has informed the Monitor that no unexploded submunitions remain.[11]