About 100 countries, including Japan, signed a treaty Dec. 3 in Oslo to ban cluster bombs. It goes into effect about six months after 30 countries have ratified it. Japan should start the ratification procedure as soon as possible.
Bomblets clustered into bombs are scattered over vast areas and often fail to explode immediately. They can explode a long time after military conflicts, killing and injuring civilians. A 2006 study by the nongovernmental organization Handicap International covering 24 countries says cluster bombs killed or maimed some 11,000 people over three decades and that 98 percent of them were civilians and about 27 percent children.
The treaty bans use, development, production, procurement, stockpiling and transfer of cluster bombs. Signatories have agreed to dispose of existing stockpiles within eight years and to support activities designed to remove dud bomblets and help victims.