LM Report 2003

Singapore

The Republic of Singapore has not acceded to the Mine Ban Treaty. It reiterated its position on the mine ban: “Singapore is against the indiscriminate use of anti-personnel landmines (APLs), especially against civilians. However, we believe that the legitimate security concerns and right to self-defence of states should not be disregarded.”^[1] Singapore has, however, voted in favor of every pro-ban UN General Assembly resolution since 1996, including UN General Assembly Resolution 57/74 in November 2002 calling for universalization of the Mine Ban Treaty.

Singapore attended as an observer the Fourth Meeting of States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty in September 2002 and the Fourth Annual Conference of States Parties to Amended Protocol II of the Convention of Conventional Weapons in December 2002. Singapore also participated in the regional seminar, “Building a Cooperative Future of Mine Action in Southeast Asia,” held in Phnom Penh on 26 -28 March 2003. It did not attend Mine Ban Treaty intersessional meetings in February and May 2003.

Singapore Technologies Kinetics Ltd. continues to produce antipersonnel landmines.^[2] The First Secretary of the Embassy of Singapore to Thailand told to Landmine Monitor, “Singapore continues to exercise strict control over the production of landmines in Singapore. SK Kinetics remains the only company in Singapore that manufactures landmines.”^[3] Two antipersonnel mines are produced, both copies of Italian designs: a plastic blast mine (VS-50) and a bounding fragmentation mine (VS-69). Singapore states that an indefinite moratorium on export of all types of antipersonnel mines is still in force.^[4] In December 2000, a Ministry of Defense representative stated that Singapore stockpiles antipersonnel mines for “training and defensive purposes only.”^[5] The number of stockpiled mines remains unknown.

Singapore is not mine-affected. Singapore has never contributed to international humanitarian mine action programs.

[1] Fax from Pong Kok Tian, First Secretary, Embassy of Singapore to Thailand, Bangkok 23 June 2003.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] See Landmine Monitor Report 2001, p. 576.