Human Rights Watch: Ukraine, Syria: Incendiary Weapons Threaten Civilians
Evidence of the use of incendiary weapons in Ukraine and Syria highlights the need for stricter law to govern these weapons, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today with Harvard Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic.
The 16-page report, “Incendiary Weapons: Recent Use and Growing Opposition,” details incendiary weapon attacks in Ukraine and Syria and illustrates the increasing stigma against the weapons. Incendiary weapons can cause excruciatingly painful thermal and respiratory burns. Victims who survive often suffer long-term physical and psychological damage due to extensive scarring and disfigurement.
Human Rights Watch documented attacks with incendiary Grad rockets on two towns in Ukraine, although the organization was unable to confirm the party responsible. In Syria in 2014, government forces have continued their use of incendiary weapons and have also dropped indiscriminate barrel bombs containing incendiary components.
Countries should seize this moment to strengthen Protocol III because there is growing recognition that incendiary weapons cause unacceptable harm, the organizations said. For example, Israel avoided use of white phosphorus munitions during its 2014 military operations in Gaza, apparently because of the international criticism generated by its use of these munitions in 2009 in Gaza. Over the past year, at least a dozen countries have expressed concern at the civilian casualties from the use of incendiary weapons.
http://www.hrw.org/news/2014/11/10/ukraine-syria-incendiary-weapons-threaten-civilians
HRW has found the Syrian government and either or both of the Ukrainian government and rebels guilty of using incendiary weapons. Not much will come of this undoubtedly, but it always good to add to the evidence of misdeeds by the participants in these civil wars no matter which side one supports.