War in Ukraine | Washington will supply antipersonnel mines to Kyiv

Anticipating an advance by Russian troops, the Biden administration agreed on Wednesday to provide antipersonnel mines to Ukraine, which requested them. A gesture criticized by human rights organizations.

What are antipersonnel mines?

These are small mines that can be placed in forests, fields or along paths and which explode when pressure is applied. Ukraine manufactures antipersonnel mines and already uses them on its territory, but has asked Washington to provide more.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked the United States on Wednesday for sending mines, calling them “essential” to stopping Russian assaults.

Why now?

Russian troops are advancing in eastern Ukraine, particularly in Donetsk, and American and Ukrainian military strategists are seeking to halt this advance. The United States was already supplying anti-tank assault mines to Ukraine, but this announcement shows that other types of mines now appear necessary on the battlefield to harm troops advancing on foot.

On Sunday, Washington also authorized Kyiv to fire on Russian territory with long-range American missiles, which the Kremlin had presented as a “red line” not to be exceeded and which would lead to consequences.

In addition to landmines, the $275 million U.S. aid package announced this week includes drones, HIMARS munitions and artillery.

What types of antipersonnel mines will be provided?

Lloyd Austin, US Defense Secretary, said on Wednesday that the mines provided would be more sophisticated than mines already used in Ukraine. “The landmines we would seek to provide to them would be non-persistent landmines,” he said. That is, we can control when they self-activate, self-trigger, which makes them much safer in the long term than the mines they make [en Ukraine]. »

Non-persistent landmines require batteries to operate, so over time they can no longer detonate. This makes them potentially safer for the population than traditional mines, which remain deadly for years or even decades.

Currently, mines are also dispersed on Ukrainian territory using drones. Both the Ukrainian army and the Russian army have adopted this tactic. This allows both sides to quickly create minefields in hard-to-reach or dangerous areas.

Antipersonnel mines are not prohibited?

Indeed, a majority of countries, including Ukraine, agreed to ban the use of antipersonnel mines by ratifying the Ottawa Treaty in 1997. But neither Russia nor the United States signed this treaty.

In an interview with the BBC on Wednesday, Mary Wareham, deputy director of the arms division of Human Rights Watch, said Washington’s decision to supply antipersonnel mines to Ukraine was a “shocking and devastating development” for those who work to eradicate antipersonnel landmines worldwide.

“Enormous progress has been made over the past 25 years under the international treaty banning landmines. “It is therefore inconceivable that the United States would take this action” today, she said.

The United Nations said last month that nearly 1,500 Ukrainian civilians have been seriously injured or killed by undetonated mines and munitions since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in 2022.

According to the United Nations, Ukraine is the most mined country in the world.

Would sending antipersonnel mines be a new step in the invasion of Ukraine?

This could be perceived as such by Moscow. On Tuesday, Russia warned it would respond to Ukraine’s firing of longer-range missiles, which reportedly hit targets in Russia’s Bryansk region.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the missile attack showed Western countries wanted to “escalate” the conflict.

Since the election of Donald Trump, White House officials have told New York Times speaking on condition of anonymity that the benefits of sending more sophisticated equipment to Ukraine were greater than the risks of escalating the conflict with Moscow.

With the Associated Press