Latvia is the first European country to abandon the Ottawa Convention against anti-personnel mines. Four other states want to follow suit.
Latvia has approved its withdrawal from the Ottawa Convention, the international treaty that has banned the production, stockpiling and use of anti-personnel mines for decades. The parliament in Riga approved the withdrawal by a vote held on Wednesday 16 April. And it did so by a very large majority, a sign of strong conviction on the part of the institutions of the Baltic republic.
The reason behind the decision had already been announced previously and was reiterated in a statement signed by Inara Murniece, chair of the parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee: "Our withdrawal from the Ottawa Convention on anti-personnel mines will give our armed forces room to manoeuvre in the event of military threats and will allow them to use all possible means to defend our citizens."
In the name of rearmament and fear of an attack by Russia, then, the decision has been made to allow troops to use weapons that have been considered unacceptable on humanitarian grounds for nearly thirty years. Anti-personnel mines are devices that remain present in territories for years and years, and which therefore continue to claim victims even after truces, ceasefires and peace agreements. As if, after the end of a war, certain missile systems were to continue launching rockets at an enemy that no longer exists, for years on end.
It is precisely for this reason that anti-personnel mines pose a danger above all to civilian populations: Gilles Carbonnier, Vice President of the International Committee of the Red Cross, told Euronews that "80 per cent of victims are civilians, and in particular children". Those who are blown up are farmers ploughing their fields, families walking through meadows and children playing football. For this reason, Carbonnier regards anti-personnel mines as "weapons of the past" that are no longer even particularly effective from a military standpoint.
And yet, in the collective frenzy of rearmament that we are living through, we must even witness backward steps like the one decided by Latvia. Which, it should be said, is not the only nation seeking to abandon the Ottawa Convention, adopted in 1997, which entered into force in 1999 and has been ratified by 164 countries (but not by China, India, Iran, Israel, North Korea, Russia, South Korea and the United States). Estonia, Lithuania and Poland have also announced their intention to rehabilitate anti-personnel mines, through a joint statement by their Defence Ministers. And it is easy to imagine that the parliaments of Warsaw, Vilnius and Tallinn will also approve such choices — which Finland is likewise considering.
In practical terms, Latvia will now have to wait six months from the notification of its withdrawal from the treaty before it can resume producing and/or stockpiling anti-personnel mines. "A dangerous return to the past that risks undoing decades of global efforts to eradicate these inhumane devices," the International Committee of the Red Cross commented in an official statement. One must wonder how Europe will continue to hold itself up as the "home of rights" or to claim that "we, even in times of war, abide by certain rules", if it accepts the use of even devices of this kind.
