US landmine offer to Ukraine throws global treaty into 'crisis'

Russia fires over 100 drones at Ukraine, one dead, Kyiv says

FE Team | Published: November 29, 2024 22:54:14

SIEM REAP, Cambodia, Nov 29 (AFP): A US offer to give Ukraine anti-personnel mines to help battle Russia's invasion has thrown a landmark global anti-landmine treaty into "crisis", campaigners said Friday, urging Kyiv to snub the proposal.
Ukraine is one of 164 signatories to the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, which prohibits the use, stockpiling, production and transfer of landmines.
The United States, which is not, said last week it would transfer landmines to Ukraine, prompting condemnation from rights groups.
The offer has thrown the treaty into "crisis", Tamar Gabelnic, director of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, told a meeting of signatories in Cambodia's Siem Reap.
"We therefore hope very much that the mines offered by the US will be firmly rejected by Ukraine," she said.
"We have heard some concerns raised by the community," Ukraine defence official Yevhenii Kivshyk told the Siem Reap conference on Friday.
"They will be conveyed to the government of Ukraine."
Ukraine's delegation in Siem Reap has refused multiple requests by AFP journalists for comment on the landmine offer.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has called the mines "very important" to halting Russian attacks.
On Thursday, an official from Finland's defence ministry said it was contemplating if anti-personnel landmines should be brought back into its arsenal.
Finland abandoned the weapon in 2012 when it joined the anti-mine treaty but advocates for their use argue the country's security environment has changed due to Russia's war in Ukraine.
Finland dropped decades of military non-alignment and became a NATO member last year.
That move angered its eastern neighbour Russia, with which it shares a 1,340-kilometre (830-mile) border -- the longest in the US-led defence alliance.
The Siem Reap conference is a five-yearly meeting held by signatories to the anti-landmine treaty to assess progress in its objective towards a world without antipersonnel mines.
On Tuesday, landmine victims from across the world gathered at the meeting to protest Washington's decision to supply Ukraine with landmines.
More than 100 demonstrators lined the walkway to the conference venue.
Another report adds: Russia launched more than a hundred drones at Ukraine overnight and early Friday, killing one person and wounding eight others, officials said.
The nearly three-year war has seen a sharp escalation in recent days, with Moscow pummelling Ukraine's energy infrastructure ahead of the winter.
Friday's drone barrage came a day after Russia launched around 90 missiles on the war-torn country, cutting power to over a million people.
Moscow fired 132 drones overnight, of which "88 drones were shot down" and "41 were lost, presumably due to defence countermeasures", Ukraine's air force said.
Air defences shot down drones over a dozen regions, while falling debris damaged a health care clinic in the capital Kyiv, according to the local mayor.
A drone attack killed a woman in the southern city of Kherson, the head of the local military administration Roman Mrochko said.
At least two regions suffered power cuts on Friday, Ukrainian electricity operator Ukrenergo said.
"Emergency repair works are ongoing around the clock. By the end of the day, the power company plans to restore power to the de-energised customers in Kherson and Mykolaiv regions," it said.
The latest strikes come as Ukraine enters a tough winter, with Russian forces stepping up aerial attacks and advancing on the eastern front.
Moscow said Friday it had seized the village of Rozdolne in the southern part of Ukraine's Donbas region, where it has made a string of territorial gains in recent months.
Russia downed 47 attack drones fired overnight by Ukraine, mainly targeting the Rostov border region where a major fire broke out at an industrial site, authorities said.