Speech at the Conference on the Convention on Cluster Munitions

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Dear Minister, Dear Deputy Minister, Your excellencies, Dear friends of the Convention on Cluster Munitions,

First of all, I would like to thank our hosts here in Chile for organising this important meeting. For your leadership and commitment to this cause and for your hospitality, which is particularly appreciated in view of the earthquake and the reconstruction challenges you have faced this spring.

It is a great honour for me to address this first global meeting on the Convention on Cluster Munitions since we secured the thirtieth ratification and thus its entry into force.

In less than two months, the Convention will become binding international law – just two years after it was adopted in Dublin, and less than four years since the process that resulted in the Convention started.

In the world of multilateral diplomacy this is no small feat.

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This Convention bans a weapon, but it is first and foremost about people.

It is about preventing people becoming victims of cluster munitions.

And it is about securing proper assistance to those who have already become victims of this indiscriminate weapon.

Cluster munitions cannot distinguish between soldiers and civilians, wartime or peace.

They kill and maim civilians both at the time of use and for a long time after the end of conflict.

It was the documented humanitarian impact of cluster munitions over several decades that spurred the international community to take action. The result is a comprehensive ban on an entire category of conventional weapons.

And, together with the Mine Ban Convention, it contributes even further to the stigmatization of weapons that are incapable of distinguishing between combatants and civilians.

The Convention has stigmatised the use of a type of weapon that has caused unacceptable humanitarian harm to civilians for decades, a type of weapon that, until we started the process to ban it, was seen as legitimate and indispensible by many states.

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The ban has saved many lives, but, for some the ban came too late.

In the fall of 2006 I met Mohammed in South Lebanon – an 11-year old boy who had been driving with his father on their motorbike.

They hit an unexploded cluster submunition, one of thousands littering Lebanon following the 2006 war with Israel. Mohammed lost both his legs. No treaty can bring them back.

But what it can do is to prevent others from becoming new victims.

The Convention is important – also for Mohammed and other cluster munition victims. As with its predecessor – the 1997 Mine Ban Convention – the Convention on Cluster Munitions is not only a ban on production, use and stockpiling, but also a framework for positive actions to address the harm caused.

When implemented, the Convention will lead to concrete improvements in affected communities.

Efforts to clear areas contaminated by cluster munitions will be increased.

It will also benefit victims of cluster munitions through an increased commitment to various types of support, including medical and rehabilitation.

Most importantly, the Convention can prevent tremendous human suffering by ensuring that hundreds of millions of cluster submunitions are never used.

But the Convention will only matter for them if we, the States Parties, live up to our commitments.

Therefore, our main challenge in the coming years will be the efficient implementation of all the obligations enshrined in the Convention.

While it is State Parties that have the primary responsibility to clear and destroy cluster munition remnants located in areas under their jurisdiction or control, all States Parties in a position to do so, have clear obligations under Article 6 to provide assistance and facilitate cooperation in the areas of victim assistance, clearance and stockpile destruction.

This is important because the Convention is founded on a partnership between states affected and those not affected by cluster munitions, together with international organisations and civil society.

It is only by strengthening and deepening this partnership that we can secure the full implementation of the Convention.

The main theme for this conference is cooperation and assistance, and I commend our hosts for providing us with an opportunity to discuss this important issue in more detail. I am confident that the coming discussions will help prepare for a very successful First Meeting of States Parties in Laos in November.

Allow me to reflect on the importance of this Convention for other pressing international issues. The Convention was the first new international disarmament agreement in a decade; before that the Mine Ban Convention had a similar role.

What can we learn from the processes that brought them about that can help us in overcoming current challenges on the international security agenda?  I believe there are two key aspects:

First of all, their humanitarian focus. Both processes were based on real and tangible security threats against ordinary people – and took their situation as a frame of reference for the policy process.

Humanitarian and human rights practitioners were brought to the negotiating table, to supplement the competence of the traditional disarmament diplomats.

The contributions made by civil society to the processes were crucial.

We would not have reached our ambitious goals had it not been for the expertise and persistence of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and the Cluster Munition Coalition.

Secondly, there was a realisation that at the end of the day, these were essentially political questions and had to be dealt with accordingly.

The disarmament machinery had tried for years to develop adequate responses to the problems caused by both landmines and cluster munitions.

When my Government in 2006 invited States, the UN, the ICRC and the CMC to join us in a process to ban cluster munitions, this was based on very clear political analysis:

The only way to achieve this was to build on the experience gained from the Mine Ban Convention and reframe what was originally a technical, Geneva-based process as an open and inclusive global process with a political aim and a humanitarian rationale.

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Lack of political will is often blamed for lack of results in international work.

As a politician, I believe that political will is not a static resource waiting to be tapped, but a dynamic force that must be encouraged, nurtured and created.

If we make good use of the positive experiences we have gained from the Mine Ban Convention and the Convention on Cluster Munitions, we may be able to achieve some success in these other processes, too.

In my view, this means we must take a clear humanitarian approach, base our policy options on the empirical facts in affected areas, and ensure the inclusion of relevant civil society actors and, not least, those affected by the use or presence of the weapons in question.

The crucial participation of survivors and advocates from civil society in the Ottawa and Oslo processes provided strong and important contributions to achieving these categorical bans. The participation of survivors in the processes ensured that negotiations stayed focused throughout on the actual realities on the ground.

We were, and we continue to be, dependent on the insights and competence of survivors in defining our tasks and mission.

And we must also acknowledge the fact that the issues are, ultimately, political.

Some 750 000 people are killed every year due to armed violence. This has unacceptable developmental, humanitarian and human rights consequences. The Oslo Commitments on Armed Violence –endorsed by more than 60 countries – commit states to concrete actions that are crucial to preventing and reducing armed violence.

Politicians are completely dependent on the technical, humanitarian, military and diplomatic experts who are working closely with these issues – but at the end of the day, it is our responsibility to act and to try to make a real difference. A difference that will improve the lives and security of the people affected.

The Oslo process came about as a response to the humanitarian problem caused by the use of cluster munitions. Therefore, the real measure of the success of our work will be, and should be, the actual difference the Convention on Cluster Munitions makes on the ground in affected communities – for Mohammed and other survivors – and for those who will be spared due to our joint efforts.

On behalf of Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg I would like to wish you a successful conference.

Thank you for your attention.