DECRYPTION – Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin defended the decision taken Wednesday by the Americans by pointing to a change in Russia's tactics on the battlefield. However, these weapons are controversial.
United States financial and military support for Ukraine continues. US President Joe Biden authorized the delivery of American-made anti-personnel mines to Ukraine on Wednesday, a decision that sparked the reaction of many NGOs who pointed out the long-term impact on civilians of these weapons intended to slow down the Russia's advance.
What are antipersonnel landmines?
Antipersonnel mines are small explosive devices that kill and maim people long after conflicts have ended. Buried or hidden on the ground, they activate when a person approaches or comes into contact with them, often causing mutilation if not death. There are many types, some shaped like hockey pucks, others like cylinders or even cones.
They are different from anti-tank mines, designed to destroy armored vehicles. These weapons are rather used to mutilate opponents and cause significant bodily harm, and are less primarily intended to kill. The goal being, ultimately, to overwhelm the enemy's logistical and medical resources.
Generally, these mines are used for defensive purposes, in particular to protect installations or direct an enemy in a desired direction. They can also help cover a retreat or set up an ambush.
Some landmines have a limited lifespan and therefore cease to function after a certain period of time, as the United States General Staff claimed to justify their delivery to Ukrainian troops, but others may remain dangerous long afterward. have been placed. They can be placed both under the surface and in a trapped building, and also on the ground. Rockets, cluster bombs and artillery shells are the most effective means of countering these weapons.
Who uses antipersonnel mines?
The Russian army uses “widely” these explosives on Ukrainian territory since the large-scale invasion in February 2022, with “at least 13 types of antipersonnel mines deployed”points out a global report published Wednesday by the Landmine Observatory.
Of the “credible information” also indicate that Ukrainian forces used them, notes the research arm of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), a network of non-governmental organizations. According to this report, at least 580 Ukrainians were killed or injured by antipersonnel mines or explosive remnants in 2023, making Ukraine the fourth country in the world most affected by this scourge.
In June 2022, the Biden administration then announced that it was renouncing their use outside the Korean peninsula, pledging to no longer develop, produce or export them. But that same year, the United States assured to do its part in this difficult work of destroying mines, recalling having invested more than 4.2 billion dollars in around a hundred countries since 1993 via programs to destroy conventional weapons. “We will continue this important work”declared Adrienne Watson, spokesperson for the National Security Council, an body attached to the presidency.
Why are they controversial?
Antipersonnel mines “do not know the difference between soldiers and civilians” and continue long after their installation to explode in contact with farmers or even children, deplores Alma Taslidzan, from the NGO Handicap international, interviewed by AFP. These weapons are not “not ethical”regrets this expert from Bosnia-Herzegovina, a country where, she says, “contamination (from mines) remains massive 30 years after the war”despite millions of euros spent on demining.
While the Ukrainian army seems to be on the decline in the face of Moscow's forces, supporters of these mines “could argue that they serve as a defensive tool to slow or block invading forces”estimates Alma Taslidzan. But the “long-term consequences (…) outweigh short-term military benefits”she affirms, and it is therefore “unjustifiable” to use these weapons which will continue to strike civilians “years and decades after the conflict”. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, they “leave a lasting legacy of death, injury and suffering” and make “impossible the exploitation of vast areas of land” for several decades.
According to Washington, those sent to kyiv will be “non-persistent”that is to say equipped with a self-destruction or self-deactivation device supposed to limit civilian losses over the long term. However, these “self-destruct or self-deactivation mechanisms are not 100% reliable” and provide no absolute guarantee that they will not explode when civilians pass by or, later, when deminers are at work, according to Alma Taslidzan.
Antipersonnel mines, “explosive remnants of war” and the “improvised mines” killed an average of 19 people every day in 2020, according to the latest tally from the Landmine Monitor.
Are these mines legal?
Some 164 states and territories, including Ukraine, signed the 1997 Ottawa Convention on the Ban and Elimination of Anti-Personnel Mines. But neither Russia, nor China, nor the United States have ratified this text.
However, in 1991, the United States stopped using antipersonnel mines, stopped exporting them in 1992 and producing them in 1997. Explosives intended for Ukraine are therefore “obsolete antipersonnel mines still in American stockpiles”aged at least 27 years, including “batteries deteriorate with age”explains to AFP underlines Mary Wareham, of the NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW), who says she is not “not even sure that (they) will work as expected”.
Under Barack Obama, the United States decided to “do not extend or modify the life of batteries” of these mines which were to “expire in the early 2030s”she recalls. Ukraine has announced that it may withdraw from the treaty for military reasons.
