Landmines and Cluster Munitions
(3 weeks, 1 day ago)
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Lord Verdirame
To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the announcement by NATO allies, including Baltic states and Poland, that they intend to withdraw from the Ottawa Treaty on anti-personnel landmines and the Convention on Cluster Munitions.
Lord Verdirame (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I thank everyone who will be speaking today. No doubt we will hear a range of views. I am sure all of us would rather this debate had been prompted by new ratifications of these treaties, rather than withdrawals, and by a more reassuring security situation in Europe. But I trust we can all agree that it is not a lack of commitment to international law or to arms control that has led Poland, Finland and the Baltic states to announce their withdrawal from the Ottawa treaty and Lithuania to withdraw from the Oslo Convention on Cluster Munitions. These are free, law-abiding, peace-loving nations led by mainstream political parties: centrist parties affiliated with the European People’s Party in Poland, Finland and Latvia, social democrats in Lithuania and the liberals in Estonia.
I co-authored the recent report by Policy Exchange on these developments. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Godson, for his intellectual leadership and Air Marshal Ed Stringer, a senior fellow at Policy Exchange, for his invaluable expertise on defence matters. There is a question mark in the title of that report because I do not yet have firm answers to the questions we posed, but these questions are urgent and we need to hear what our Government’s thinking is.
On that note, in an Answer to a Written Question on this topic on Tuesday, the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, said the UK will continue
“to engage bilaterally on the actions States plan to take”.
Can the Minister tell us a bit more about the engagement that the Government have had so far with our five allies, following their announcement? Can she also tell us whether there has been any engagement with the French Government on this matter?
While our focus today is on the Ottawa treaty and the Oslo Convention on Cluster Munitions, we must remember that other important treaties and arrangements for our security are in crisis. The 1990 Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe was suspended by Russia in 2007. In November 2023, Russia withdrew. Russia has also withdrawn from the open skies treaty. Russia has stopped all verification visits under the 2011 Vienna Document, a very important confidence and security-building instrument.
On the non-conventional front, the picture is also very concerning. Since 2018, NATO has declared Russia in breach of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. The US withdrew in 2019, citing Russia’s continued non-compliance as a reason. In 2023, Russia rescinded its ratification—as it put it—of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty.
Russia was never a party to the Ottawa treaty, although it was, and still is, a party to a pre-Ottawa treaty that regulates, but does not ban, the use of landmines. Everyone else in Europe, including Belarus, joined the Ottawa treaty. The Americans did not. The main reason they gave was the defence of South Korea, which has a land boundary of 240 kilometres with North Korea. South Korea has a very advanced military with an active personnel of 500,000 and the second-largest reserve army in the world at more than 3 million. There is a long-standing and significant American military presence in South Korea. Each of the five countries that announced its withdrawal from the Ottawa treaty has a longer land boundary with Russia and Belarus than South Korea has with North Korea. Their armed forces are considerably smaller than South Korea’s, and the Joint Expeditionary Force, which we lead, is also smaller than the US forces in the Korean peninsula. In that sense, it is not surprising that these European allies, in the much more challenging position they face, with Russia on the other side, have concluded that they too may need anti-personnel landmines for their defence.
At this point, the only NATO country sharing a border with Russia that has said it will not withdraw from Ottawa is Norway. Given where that boundary is—some 250 miles north of the Arctic Circle—Norway is simply not as vulnerable to a land invasion from Russia as the other five states.
Where do these developments leave Britain as a state party to the Ottawa treaty, committed, as we are, to the defence of our allies? The obligations under Article 1 are very far reaching. We cannot use anti-personnel landmines, retain them or transfer them directly or indirectly to anyone. Nor can we assist or encourage, in any way, anyone to use them. Section 2 of the Landmines Act 1998 creates various domestic law offences based on these provisions. If anti-personnel landmines become, for better or worse, an important part of the defensive strategy of front-line NATO states, do the Government believe that we can be as effective in defending them while we remain subject to these far-reaching obligations? Have we asked these allies what they think?
To justify our co-operation with them, we would have to rely on a declaration we made on ratification of the Ottawa treaty in 1998. This declaration says that the UK’s understanding is that
“mere participation in the planning or execution of operations”
with non-state parties that use anti-personnel landmines is not a form of assistance prohibited under the treaty. But we are more than mere participants; we are the lead nation of the Joint Expeditionary Force, and therefore the NATO country that would have to lead in the defence of Estonia. Do the Government consider that this unilateral declaration remains fit for purpose in the current situation, and that it would survive legal challenge?
The Cluster Munitions Convention was concluded 10 years after the Ottawa treaty. By then, Russia’s neighbours were becoming nervous. Poland, Finland, Latvia, Estonia, Romania, Ukraine, Turkey and, of course, the United States all stayed out. The one country that went in is Lithuania, but it has now withdrawn. Unlike the Ottawa treaty, the Cluster Munitions Convention does have a provision, Article 21(3), that expressly permits state parties to
“engage in military … operations with States not party to this Convention that might engage in activities prohibited to a State Party”.
The then Defence Secretary, the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, who I know intended to speak today, would have reminded us that this was a key provision from a UK perspective, because it meant we could still operate with the Americans and rely on them, but is it sufficient now?
The Prime Minister, who must be congratulated on his leadership throughout this crisis, has said that the Europeans must now be ready to do the “heavy lifting”. He said, rightly, that ours is
“an era where peace … depends upon strength and deterrence”.—[Official Report, Commons, 3/3/25; col. 25.]
If that is so, can Europe’s two main military powers—the UK and France—really afford to deprive themselves of this capability? Let us not forget that both the Ottawa treaty and the Oslo convention provide that if the withdrawing state is engaged in an armed conflict, the withdrawal will take effect only after the end of the armed conflict. Ukraine, for example, remains bound by the Ottawa treaty until the end of its conflict with Russia, even though Russia is not a party. So this rule applies even if one party is the victim of unprovoked aggression by a non-party.
We must therefore consider now the impact on our potential deployment in Ukraine. The purpose of such deployment would be to deter—or to dissuade, as President Macron put it—further Russian aggression. Cluster munitions and anti-personnel landmines have been used widely by both parties in the Ukrainian-Russian conflict. I have read no analysis that suggests that you could be an effective belligerent in that theatre without these capabilities. Indeed, one of the last decisions of the Biden Administration was to supply Ukraine with anti-personnel landmines because, as the then US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin put it, Russia had changed its tactics and so Ukraine needed them.
Would it be wise to deploy British troops without equipping them with the capabilities that—according to the Americans, the Ukrainians and other front-line NATO allies—are necessary in that very theatre? If we did, would such a deployment have the credibility that effective deterrence requires? In a widely reported speech last month, Prime Minister Tusk said that Poland must achieve “the most modern capabilities”, even in
“nuclear weapons and modern non-conventional weapons”.
That is an alarming statement, and we must consider how best to respond to the concerns that prompted it. Is this not the time to provide Poland and other allies with maximum reassurance on the conventional front to lower any incentive they might have to explore the acquisition of non-conventional weapons? How can we reassure them effectively if we are not prepared to consider reacquiring conventional capabilities that under previous assumptions we thought we could dispense with but that have turned out to be necessary?
We cannot avoid conventional rearmament in Europe, but we cannot afford—and may still have time to prevent—non-conventional proliferation. If we are too cautious on the conventional weapons front, we might miss an opportunity to defuse a far more terrifying arms race. As the Prime Minister said, we face tough decisions—and this might be one of them.
Lord Dubs (Lab)
My Lords, I take a different view from that of the noble Lord. For a long time I have been involved in campaigns against anti-personnel landmines and cluster munitions. Indeed, I have visited the clearing teams in south Lebanon dealing with cluster bombs, and I have met the MAG people in Vietnam who were clearing unexploded ordnance all over the country.
Sixty countries are contaminated. For example, 2 million landmines have been put in Ukraine since February 2022. The problem is that both cluster bombs and landmines are there long after the conflict is over. Cluster bombs do not always explode on impact, and the landmines are hidden away, causing enormous danger to civilians who want to go there long after the conflict: children playing and women collecting water or planting crops. We are leaving countries badly contaminated. The military uses are questionable. I remember an American marine general saying that he would not send his marines where there had been cluster bombs, because if they were to march forward, they would get injured by them.
I attended the Dublin meeting, at which the UK’s influence was maximal. Gordon Brown sent a message saying, “We should sign” on cluster bombs. Other countries said, “If the UK supports this, it must be okay”. We have led the world and set a good example.
Refugees cannot go home safely because their land and fields are contaminated. In Afghanistan, there are 2,200 staff clearing mines and other ordnance. About half of them have been removed already.
I very much regret that Poland and the Baltic states have taken the view they have. The UK should set an example through continuing to fund the clearance of landmines. I feel very emotional about this. I hope the Minister will respond positively.
Earl Attlee (Con)
My Lords, it is an honour to follow the noble Lord, Lord Dubs. We have debated this issue before—18 years ago. I have to say that, in the 25 years I have known the noble Lord, he does not seem to have aged at all. He is still just as effective.
According to your Lordships’ Library, there are only two people in this Parliament who have both operational overseas military experience and operational overseas aid experience—the other one is Alex Ballinger MP.
In 2006, I was the only Back Bencher who counselled caution about the noble Lord’s Bill, and my counsel on the issue has not changed. Some may think that the military advice from myself—and, more importantly, from the noble and gallant Lord who will speak shortly—takes no account of the suffering caused by these munitions and is heartless. Nothing could be further from the truth.
In 1995, I was running an NGO in Rwanda. Every time I passed a hospital in Kigali, I saw young Rwandan soldiers with either one or both lower limbs missing. The blood was often still seeping through their bandages. These images are still with me now, just as strongly as the fatalities and other life-threatening emergencies I have had to deal with. Obviously, these soldiers were victims of landmines.
However, my counsel is to support the Policy Exchange paper and listen very carefully to the noble and gallant Lord.
Finally, the Minister will have to make even more really difficult decisions—and quite soon, because of the six-month rule.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, it is a pleasure following both noble Lords, Lord Attlee and Lord Dubs.
At our safe distance away from the front line of facing Putin’s Russia, it is harder for us to understand the threat that the Baltic states, Poland, Finland and other countries face.
Many people think that landmines are a tool of wars past, but Russia’s war on Ukraine is an old-style war, with trenches in the grinding front line. Drones and other modern techniques have added to—not taken away—the threat of unexploded ordnance. Ukraine now has the largest amount of unexploded ordnance in the world.
During the debate on International Women’s Day, I spoke of the all-women landmine teams in Ukraine and other countries who are trained and supported by UK-based HALO and MAG and funded by international aid from a number of countries, including the UK. At a time when other European countries talk of leaving the Ottawa agreement because of threats of invasion on their doorsteps, it is vital that this aid continues.
Tomorrow is Anti-Landmine Day. Today, in the APPG, we heard of a de-mining programme that also helps local people develop and enrich the cleared soil and start growing things again: wheat, vines and olives, whatever the local needs are.
The FCDO has a proud history of supporting landmine and cluster bomb clearance. Regardless of the decisions by the countries facing Russia and the many other countries still living with landmines, can the Minister assure your Lordships’ House that de-mining projects will remain a priority?
This is so much more: local people are trained in a range of skills. As mines are cleared, the trained staff also work with their communities, who are still often fearful and living with the day-to-day consequences of war. They too are given the tools—the cleared earth—to rebuild their lives, create food and recreate their local economy. These FCDO grants work miracles—but, above all, these grants save lives.
Lord Stirrup (CB)
My Lords, in the brief time allotted, I want to make simply one point and pose two questions.
My point is that the law of armed conflict does not prohibit the killing of civilians. It says they must not be targeted, that they must be protected as far as is feasible, and that the risk posed to civilians by military operations must be proportionate to the military advantage sought. That point is crucial.
I come to my first question. During the Second World War, anywhere between 600,000 and 1 million civilians died in the siege of Leningrad, nearly all from starvation. If that siege could have been prevented or even truncated by the use of antipersonnel landmines and/or cluster weapons, would their use have been justified, or should the appalling death toll have been allowed to continue?
My second question is: if we were faced on our border with an aggressive, unprincipled and ruthless foe determined upon destruction and subjugation, and the use of mines and/or cluster weapons would be pivotal in deterring or defending against such a foe, would we be right to use them or should we allow our infrastructure to be destroyed, our civilians to be killed and our children to be kidnapped? Perhaps certitude is easier and more comfortable the further removed one is from the direct threat.
In thinking about the safety of civilians in war, it is crucial to weigh all the factors and to search for a balanced judgment in line with the law of armed conflict. Absolute prohibitions do not lend themselves to such weighing and judging, especially when they are applied only to the defendant.
Finally, the best way to ensure the safety of civilians is to deter aggressors from attacking in the first place. The more risk we take with deterrence, the more we risk civilian as well as military lives.
The Lord Bishop of Southwark
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Verdirame, for setting out this important matter so clearly and to other noble Lords for their very evident expertise in this area.
The attempt to regulate behaviour in times of conflict is a very old one. In classical antiquity, war without good cause risked religious pollution and divine disfavour. Your Lordships may think this did little to inhibit it. The Church’s later attempts to restrain violence in Europe developed at the most serious level into the just war theory, with its assigning of the monopoly of force to the state, a restricted list of circumstances where it might apply, and ideas of proportionality and protection of non-combatants.
At its root was the idea that violence is evil, but that, when faced with violence, force may be used, although with restraint. Men and women trained for war and arms deployed for their use have the most fearful capacity. Hence, in ancient doctrine and in modern treaties, we must place limits. I appreciate that the position of the countries named is greatly more exposed to threat than that of the United Kingdom currently, but the virtue and the impact of restraint and regulation are not felt when they are not needed. They are experienced when the pressure is upon us to take fearful measures, yet we persist in upholding the norms we have pledged to observe. That is the intent of these treaties, such as that on antipersonnel landmines and cluster munitions. They have much to commend them.
Lord Godson (Con)
My Lords, I too commend the noble Lord, Lord Verdirame, for bringing this debate and for his own prescience in the matter, notably last year in the debate here on the SDR, when he foresaw that the embattled democracies of eastern Europe might have to withdraw from the landmines treaty and cluster munitions convention.
I also commend my noble friend Lord Attlee, who will be much missed in this place, for his prescience on the matter. But there is also a particular piquancy in his intervention today, because it is 90 years since the election of his grandfather, Clement Attlee, as leader of the Labour Party. That is of direct relevance to our deliberations today, because of course “Citizen Clem” displaced the ageing pacifist George Lansbury. We all remember Ernest Bevin as leader of the TGWU and his famous remark about Lansbury hawking his conscience. It is a source of great pleasure to me that the Labour Party is now the party of Attlee and Bevin when it comes to nuclear weapons and the broader defence of our kingdom.
Unfortunately, the ghost of Lansbury is still present in too many of Labour’s deliberations when it comes to landmines and cluster munitions, and I very much hope that that will change. I was sorry that last year the Minister, in response to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, was slightly hawking her conscience as well in reproaching the Lithuanian Government for their wish to withdraw from the convention. I was sorry about that, but I welcome that in recent days—because I know that this is a work in progress—the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, responded to the noble Lord, Lord Spellar, in a Written Parliamentary Answer that the Government were indeed going to acknowledge the sovereign right of sovereign Governments to come to their own decisions, and I hope that that progress will indeed be maintained.
I have two particular questions for the Minister.
Lord Godson (Con)
Just very quickly—I will narrow it down to one, if the noble Baroness will bear with me.
Baroness Wheeler (Lab)
No. Will the noble Lord wind up, please? The limit is two minutes to allow all speakers to get in.
Lord Godson (Con)
I thank the noble Baroness. There is a carve-out in the cluster munitions convention. Will the Minister give a statement to this House on the legal viability and durability of that carve-out in the cluster munitions convention for our forces—
Baroness Wheeler (Lab)
Will the noble Lord please sit down and wind up? I thank him.
Lord Moore of Etchingham (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I should declare an interest as a senior fellow of Policy Exchange, which has produced very interesting material on all this; of course, the noble Lord, Lord Godson, is its director.
Thirty years ago, Diana, Princess of Wales, campaigned against landmines. I witnessed this because I was editing the Daily Telegraph and I sent our revered former editor Bill Deedes—Lord Deedes—to travel with her to Angola and, weeks before her tragic death, to Bosnia. He wrote beautifully about it, conveying to the world her passionate concern, which he, a holder of the Military Cross, shared. What made the Princess’s Halo Trust campaign possible were the propitious circumstances of the time. Peace seemed to have broken out, hence the Ottawa treaty of 1997.
However, that shared peace has gone and, sad to say, there is no prospect of its return. Our allies which have now withdrawn or given notice of withdrawal from Ottawa or Oslo are not heartless regimes. On the contrary, they directly confront the threat of a heartless regime, and Russia uses anti-personnel landmines, in particular, as a weapon of invasion, because it sows them in occupied Ukrainian territory and prevents reconquest, makes civilian life impossible and channels Ukrainian forces towards their death.
These allies are the countries which best understand the Russian threat, and they know they must be ready to respond in kind. I am disappointed that our Government seem to disapprove, or even to hesitate to withdraw themselves from Ottawa and Oslo. The Prime Minister rightly wants Britain to lead Europe in helping Ukraine against Russian aggression, but it is not really leadership if it primly tut, tuts when our smaller allies toughen up.
I was recently in Kyiv, and I went to see a factory there which was making robots. The robot carried two things: it carried Ukrainian landmines to plant, which would pass over minefields, and it carried a kamikaze landmine, which would blow up at the end of its mission. Surely those were necessary things to do, not things that should be prevented by adherence to a convention.
Lord Robathan (Con)
My Lords, I will speak very briefly, because I have time only for that, and I speak as who somebody has been in a minefield. Indeed, in Iraq, the wheel of the Land Rover behind me was blown off by an anti-personnel mine, and believe me, if you have just seen an anti-personnel mine go off, you do not want to get out of that Land Rover, for obvious reasons.
I have also set claymore landmines—only in training—and have been responsible for clearing landmines in the past. I refer to a speech I made on 10 July 1998 in the other place, where only I and my noble friend Lord Howard of Lympne, then shadow Foreign Secretary, expressed reservations about the Ottawa treaty, which is of course window dressing—how good we are. As a country, we last exported any landmines in 1982, I believe. I ask the Minister: how many UK anti-personnel landmines have been dug up by any agencies clearing mines since 1982?
I was a trustee and then chairman of the Halo Trust for some three years, and I visited Somaliland, Eritrea, Angola, Mozambique and Cambodia—I think. There was never a British anti-personnel mine found. Since 1998, we have had endless anti-personnel mines laid around the world.
In my dotage, I reckon I could still make an IED, an anti-personnel mine, in my kitchen. I am not intending to, for the benefit of any police, but that is what the Russians are doing in Ukraine. Are the North Koreans, the Iranians and the Chinese joining the convention? I do not think so. We all wish to see an end to anti-personnel mines. I have seen wounded people, back in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. I have seen UK soldiers maimed in Afghanistan and Iraq in the recent past. This convention does nothing for them or for peace. It takes away one line of defence from our own soldiers. If in a war we need that defence, British soldiers should have it. In 1998 I said that
“I just hope that there is never an occasion on which British soldiers are left exposed and die because they do not have anti-personnel mines in their armoury”.—[Official Report, Commons, 10/7/1998; col. 1367.]
The Duke of Wellington (CB)
My Lords, I declare an interest as one of my sons and his wife work for the Halo Trust, one of the leading de-mining charities. Also, I am a trustee of the Royal United Services Institute.
This debate is about a very difficult military and moral issue. There is no doubt that anti-personnel mines and cluster bombs disproportionately affect civilians. They make no distinction between combatants and non-combatants. The legacy of laying and dropping these weapons lasts for decades. In Cambodia, there are still mines dropped by the Americans during the Vietnam War. In Kosovo there are still mines dropped by the Americans and the British during the Bosnian war. The United Kingdom has a high moral duty to safeguard this Ottawa convention, of which it was a founder signatory in 1998.
However, 25 years later, the military situation in Europe has changed unimaginably. The Russians have laid hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of mines in Ukraine, which will take billions of pounds and decades to clear. It is very understandable that the Baltic states and other states bordering Russia and Belarus should feel it necessary to be able to defend themselves against further Russian aggression. Anti-tank mines can normally not be activated by human beings, and they can still be used. Modern technology has developed smart landmines, which can be activated and de-activated remotely. I humbly suggest to the Minister that the Government seek to preserve the principles of the Ottawa convention but attempt to modify it to take account of the new technologies and the transformed military situation in Europe.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, I begin with an experience from 1998 when I was in Cambodia, on a bus going through a village beside a river. Looking out of the window, I spied some faded hazard tape wrapped roughly round a small lump in the road. Getting closer, about as far away as that Dispatch Box is from me now, I realised that it was a small bomb—a cartoon-style cylinder with fins on the end, its head buried in the road. That was not a landmine or a cluster munition. In some ways, it was less dangerous than either for being more visible and more obvious. But it was a reminder that the deadly legacy of war often lingers decades after the conflict ends, and that weapons—particularly the highly portable weapons that we are discussing today—cannot, once let loose on the world, be contained to one place.
That small bomb, I suspect, had been washed to that location by a flood, and landmines can easily be moved that way or by land movement. Yet, as the Mines Advisory Group’s excellent briefing highlights, they were also often moved by deliberate human action. Licit and illicit global trade means that a return to landmines in Europe would rapidly mean their spread to other regions—and within regions where they can easily be moved, either as a complete device or as a source of explosives for improvised devices. At a giant scale, their presence or threat means that farmers cannot go safely into their fields, children cannot play without risk of maiming or death, and often women cannot collect essential water supplies in safety.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Verdirame, for securing today’s important debate, rich as it has been in varied views, and hope that we will hear shortly from the Minister that Britain, a leading figure in both the 1997 anti-personnel mine ban convention and the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions, will continue to support them and make every diplomatic effort to see them upheld and advanced around the world.
Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston (CB)
My Lords, I declare my interest as the chair of Wilton Park. Until now, the key issues were that we were hoping to move towards the treaty’s goal of eliminating landmine possession and use, and clearing the current contamination globally. We were also looking to find new ways to finance and advance that endeavour, but we are moving into new territory now.
Upholding a global norm against possession and their use by any state is becoming far more difficult. Things are changing, and statements by Poland and the Baltic states should be seen in the context that, for the first time in the treaty’s history, a state that is not party to the treaty, Russia, has used landmines on the territory of a state that is a member, Ukraine.
The Baltics and Poland have drawn their conclusions about, first, the military utility of mines and, secondly, the capacity of the treaty to uphold anti-mine norms. We should not be surprised that countries such as Finland are beginning to have similar thoughts. If state parties to the treaty are now reviewing their policy, it is a potentially serious development for the treaty and wider norms, both of which His Majesty’s Government are very committed to.
In June 2024, Wilton Park hosted an event entitled “Preparing for success at the fifth review conference of the mine ban treaty”, ahead of the review conference that took place last November. The noble Lord, Lord Verdirame, who wisely called for this debate, asked for further engagement. I assure the Minister that Wilton Park is ready to facilitate any such further engagement.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, this is a timely debate; I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Verdirame. We face an acute international crisis and we must remember: Russia never signed these treaties. In his excellent paper for Policy Exchange and again today, the noble Lord explained the reasoned restrictions on withdrawal—in other words, to leave lawfully, a state must complete six months’ notice in time of peace. To leave when at war puts a state in breach, so now is the time.
These weapons are most unpleasant. They leave grave dangers for civilians. Those are important considerations and I do not overlook them, but Sir Ben Wallace has written that the Ottawa treaty prevented the United Kingdom and others from helping Ukraine with effective weapons, yet the Russians use them freely, as and when they like. These weapons drive opponents into confined areas, where they are easier to strike. They have been used to great effect in the Ukraine theatre. They have helped Ukraine defend itself.
To be at war against Russia, itself fighting under no such constraints, would be for us, the United Kingdom, to fight with one hand behind our backs; it would endanger our many fewer troops and make much heavier losses likely. Without them, we lose a deterrent: war will be more likely. That is why our eastern European allies plan to withdraw from the treaties. I am afraid we must do the same.
Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)
My Lords, the situation in the Baltic states and Poland is rather different from that in the United Kingdom. We need to look at the decisions of those sovereign states that have opted to withdraw from the Ottawa treaty—and, in the case of Lithuania, from the Convention on Cluster Munitions—somewhat differently from any suggestion that the United Kingdom should withdraw from treaties or conventions. The perceived threats to the Baltic states and Poland are very real and, as sovereign states, they clearly have the right to make a decision. The noble Lord, Lord Godson, suggested that perhaps His Majesty’s Government had been critical of Lithuania. Clearly, it is not the role of His Majesty’s Government or the United Kingdom to criticise our NATO partners and allies.
At the same time, there is a very strong sense in which His Majesty’s Government and the United Kingdom need to uphold the treaty obligations to which we are signatories. The noble Lord, Lord Dubs, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, talked about mines still being in place long after wars in places they have visited. In the Falklands in 2017, 35 years after the war ended, there were beaches on which one could not walk because there were still landmines. It took until 2020 for that demining to end. In Ukraine, it is likely to take 10,000 deminers working all year, every year for 10 years to get rid of the landmines that are there already.
We need to stick with our commitments. We need to ensure that the United Kingdom does not breach the international rule of law and that, as far as possible, we stick with treaty obligations so that we do not further risk escalation globally.
The Earl of Effingham (Con)
My Lords, just this week, Finland announced that it will be the latest state to withdraw from the Ottawa treaty, following in the footsteps of Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The fact that so many states, all on Europe’s eastern flank, feel threatened to the degree that they believe this step is necessary clearly demonstrates that we are living in a very different world from when the Ottawa treaty was signed. This was highlighted by comments from the Finnish Prime Minister:
“Withdrawing from the Ottawa Convention will give us the possibility to prepare for the changes in the security environment in a more versatile way”.
Given the time limit, I will ask a number of questions to the Minister. Poland, Finland and the Baltic nations are all members of NATO, and NATO members regularly operate in joint combat units. If the worst were to happen and the United Kingdom found itself dragged into a conflict with Russia, we risk a situation where British troops could operate in the same units as NATO allies who are not members of the Ottawa treaty or the Convention on Cluster Munitions. Given that the UK remains party to these treaties, what is His Majesty’s Government’s assessment of the impact on our troops of not being able to deploy the same weapons as the allies they are fighting alongside?
Equally importantly, what liability would our courageous and valiant British soldiers have for the planting of such weapons that are prohibited for use by British Armed Forces under these two treaties? How would His Majesty’s Government protect any British soldiers from being held liable?
Finally, as I believe the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Stirrup, was implying, we must be prepared to adapt our position on such treaties and agreements as circumstances change, so what assessments and scenario analyses have His Majesty’s Government made, and what are their actionable conclusions?
The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Baroness Chapman of Darlington) (Lab)
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Verdirame, for securing this debate and to all noble Lords who have contributed. We could have done with longer, because this is such a complex issue and, as many noble Lords have said, incredibly timely. I was struck that my noble friend Lord Dubs reminded us, as I knew he would, of the dangers and of the reasons why we helped to lead the formulation of these treaties in the first place. His view was echoed by the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Southwark, among others.
As the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, and the noble Baroness, Lady Stuart, said, this debate is more relevant now than it has been in the recent past. The words of the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Stirrup, resonated with me when he said that risk must be proportionate to military advantage and asked us to imagine a threat on our borders—certitude, he advises, is not always possible. I understand his argument, and I think the best thing is for me to set out the Government’s position, including answering the questions, particularly those from the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, on interoperability.
This Government remain committed to the Ottawa treaty and to the Convention on Cluster Munitions. Each treaty plays an important role in the protection of civilians, and we continue to use our best efforts to promote the treaties and their norms. It is for good reason that the UK and a majority of countries have come together to ban the use of anti-personnel landmines and cluster munitions. The human and financial costs of their use are devastating. Long after conflicts cease, civilians—and it is civilians, frequently children, who comprise the majority of victims year on year—continue to be killed, maimed and left permanently disabled by anti-personnel landmines and cluster munitions.
As well as the terrible human cost, this creates a further toll on the long-term development and health systems in countries trying to recover from conflict. Anti-personnel and cluster munitions also deny access to land, further imperilling food security. The direct financial costs of this can be devastating. The World Bank estimates that, in Ukraine alone, fully demining affected territory will cost upwards of $37 billion.
The history of these treaties predates the end of the Cold War. The first efforts to exert legal constraints on landmines were through the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, started in the early 1980s. While the CCW’s protocols set minimum standards in how landmines are used, their limitations led to the vast majority of states agreeing to and joining the Ottawa treaty in order to provide for an outright ban on landmines. Meanwhile, international proposals to prohibit cluster munitions date back to the Vietnam War era and were also first discussed in the CCW, which remains an important star chamber for future mechanisms. The UK played a major role in the negotiation of both treaties, and we continue to believe in their role and impact in protecting civilians and military personnel alike. As state parties have fulfilled their commitments, the risks to civilians from the remnants of anti-personnel landmines and cluster munitions have fallen in the vast majority of countries. It is no coincidence that, even among non-state parties, there were no officially confirmed transfers of anti-personnel landmines between 1999 and 2024, and fewer and fewer states produce either system.
However, the Government recognise that Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine has created significant challenges, upending the global security environment, raising tensions in the Euro-Atlantic space and undermining international law, including international humanitarian law. This is why the Chancellor announced last week a necessary increase in our defence budget to 2.5% of GDP and a plan to go further in the next Parliament. We will make the UK a defence industrial superpower and ensure that our Armed Forces have the equipment they need to defend our nation and our allies.
The Government’s support for Ukraine remains steadfast. We are absolutely committed to securing a just and lasting peace in Ukraine. This is vital for both Ukraine and wider Euro-Atlantic and international security and prosperity, but a just and lasting peace is possible only if we continue to show strength and provide Ukraine with the support it needs to defend itself against continued Russian aggression. This is why we recently signed a £2.6 billion loan agreement with Ukraine, earmarked for military spending, and a £1.6 billion export finance deal that will supply Ukraine with more than 5,000 air defence missiles.
Like the UK, our allies, particularly those with borders with Russia, have legitimate concerns about their security, and we recognise that they need to take difficult decisions about their own national defence. It is their sovereign right to do so, within the bounds of international law. As I noted in this Chamber in August, we regret that Lithuania took the decision to withdraw from the Convention on Cluster Munitions, a process that was completed last month. None the less, we recognise that Lithuania saw itself as an outlier in the region, and we do not anticipate further withdrawals from the CCM.
Last month, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland stated their intention to withdraw from the Ottawa treaty. We have closely engaged with them, as our allies, on this subject for many months, and we are working to understand what these decisions will mean in practice. We will work with them in an effort to ensure that they keep as close to the principles underpinning these treaties as possible to mitigate impacts on both the treaties themselves and the vital humanitarian disarmament norms that they have established. As well as a shared interest in the security of our allies, the UK also has strong defence partnerships in the region through NATO and the JEF.
While we work through any implications of the withdrawals with our partners, we are confident that we will be able to work with partners that are non-state parties. The Convention on Cluster Munitions contains explicit provisions under Article 21 concerning interoperability with non-state parties. Similarly, consistent with our position in international law, the Landmines Act 1998 provides a defence for military operations wholly or mainly outside the United Kingdom where anti-personnel landmines have been or may be deployed by a partner who is a non-state party.
The Act is clear that while it is a criminal offence for British personnel to engage in the laying of anti-personnel landmines or related activities, such as assisting, encouraging or inducing others to do so, other conduct that takes place in the course of or for the purpose of a military operation or the planning of such an operation alongside a state party would be permitted.
To conclude, the Government continue to believe that we can advance both our own national security and that of our allies, and the vital humanitarian norms that protect civilians, which these treaties represent. None the less, we cannot ignore the fundamental change in the geopolitical context that has taken place, and I am grateful to all noble Lords for raising these questions. Just as the UK played a key role in the formation of these treaties, we are happy to take the lead and work with our allies and all interested partners to consider the best way to sustain the important norms these treaties have established in this new context, while at the same time continuing to prioritise our national security.
But simply walking away will not help to achieve this. The UK’s long-term security and that of our allies is served not just by our military strength but through the establishment of and commitment to international norms and rules. The UK’s role should be to respond to Russia’s flagrant disregard for long-established global humanitarian norms by working to protect them, rebuilding confidence in the rules-based order for the long term and demonstrating that Russia is on the wrong side of history.