Lithuania will formally withdraw from the Convention on Cluster Munitions, an unprecedented move with potentially profound consequences for the protection of civilians in Lithuania and elsewhere.
This date ends the convention’s required six-month delay after Lithuania submitted its official intent to withdraw document in September 2024. Lithuania’s decision was designed to address its population’s understandably heightened sense of insecurity in the context of Russia’s war against Ukraine. But it may paradoxically increase risks to its people given the immediate and long-term danger these weapons pose to civilians.
Read more…
Source: Reliefweb News
Sign up for Counter-IED Report Newsletter
Related:
- Lithuanian, Czech chiefs of defense agree on further cooperation
February 2, 2023
Lithuania’s Chief of Defense Lieutenant General Valdemaras Rupsys and Major General Karel Rehka, Chief of the General Staff of the Czech Armed Forces, have agreed on further cooperation, the Lithuanian military said on Tuesday. “We agreed to expand military cooperation in the field of CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear security) by participating in collective level ...
- Royal Navy divers from Portsmouth undertake ‘importance’ explosives clearance using state-of-the-art drones in Lithuania
June 15, 2022
Delta Diving Unit from the Diving & Threat Exploitation Group (DTXG) based on Horsea Island in Portsmouth, practised identifying – and neutralising – a range of explosive devices in the water and ashore across Lithuania. Alongside their Canadian, Lithuanian, US, Dutch and Estonian counterparts, the Portsmouth divers scoured ports for historic ordnance from previous conflicts. Robots and ...
- NATO mine clear-up operation Open Spirit 2021 kicks off
April 19, 2021
11 states and 21 vessels with diving squads are participating in the Open Spirit 2021 NATO mine countermeasures (MCM) operation launched in Estonian waters on Monday. The main area of operation in this year’s MCM mission is the Gulf of Finland and its southeastern part Narva Bay, military spokespeople said. Groups of mine clearance vessels are ...
- Prosecutor seeks 4-year jail sentence for attempted terror attack in Lithuanian capital
September 1, 2020
The public prosecutor is seeking a reduced four-year prison sentence for Gediminas Berzinskas, a 21-year-old man who admitted to attempting to commit a terror act in Vilnius last year. Vilnius Regional Court opened his case on Monday. Berzinskas has no previous convictions, and he fully admits his guilt and regrets having committed the crime, Sarunas Astrauskas, the ...
- Joint mine clearance exercise 3B Divex started on Monday
August 10, 2020
A joint mine clearance exercise of the navies of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, 3B Divex 2020, is taking place in Narva Bay this week, in the course of which war-era explosive devices left in the area will be relocated and destroyed and international interoperability and routines of action rehearsed. 1st Lt. Priit Kaasikmäe, commander of the ...
- Lithuania: Explosion in Vilnius was planned during daytime with people around
June 26, 2020
The bomb placed at the building housing international company in Vilnius last October did not go off but it could have caused major damage to the building and injured many people, Rolandas Kiskis, chief of Lithuania’s criminal police, says. The suspect planned to detonate the bomb during daytime with many people in the building. According to Kiskis, ...
- Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland host NATO Allies for exercise ANAKONDA 2018
November 16, 2018
ANAKONDA 2018, a Polish-led multinational exercise, which began on 7 November, today completed its first week. The exercise involves around 12,500 troops in Poland and approximately 5,000 troops in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The exercise demonstrated the interoperability of the Polish Armed Forces with participating troops from 10 NATO Allies: Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Hungary, Latvia, ...