Reuters: Cluster bomb victims overwhelmingly civilian: report

[Eugene]

Cluster bomb victims overwhelmingly civilian: report

Reuters
Thursday, November 2, 2006; 4:44 AM

GENEVA (Reuters) - Civilians, a quarter of them children, make up almost all the
victims of cluster bombs over the last three decades, a humanitarian agency said
on Thursday.

In a study of 24 countries and regions, Handicap International said the controversial
weapons, which scatter munitions over a wide area, had killed, wounded or maimed
11,044 people of whom 98 percent were civilians.

-snip-

Some 27 percent of the victims were children, mainly boys, who were working or
playing in areas where munitions were lying around after failing to explode on impact.

"For 30 years governments have failed to address the disproportionate, long-term
harm these weapons cause to civilian populations," Angelo Simonazzi, the agency's
director general, said in a statement.

-snip-

Full article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/02/AR2006110200240.html

[democrank]

1. Just plain awful.

In the study mentioned 98 percent of the casualties were civilian.

[Nolo_Contendre]

2. That way they won't grow up to be terrorists

repugnican logic.

[Hav]

3. .

Oh I'm sure the right will question the numbers again...as they are so unbelievable!

[Ian David]

4. Do Not Taunt Happy Fun Ball

If Happy Fun Ball begins to smoke, get away immediately. Seek shelter and cover head.

Happy Fun Ball may stick to certain types of skin.

When not in use, Happy Fun Ball should be returned to its special container and kept under refrigeration...

Failure to do so relieves the makers of Happy Fun Ball, Wacky Products Incorporated, and its parent company Global Chemical Unlimited, of any and all liability.

Ingredients of Happy Fun Ball include an unknown glowing substance which fell to Earth, presumably from outer space.

Happy Fun Ball has been shipped to our troops in Saudi Arabia and is also being dropped by our warplanes on Iraq.

Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.

Happy Fun Ball comes with a lifetime guarantee.

Happy Fun Ball

ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES!

http://www.happyfunball.com/hfb.html

[sugapablo]

5. Well no shit...

In modern day warfare, we have wars where armies (such as the US and Israel) are forced to fight civilian "combatants", not national armies. So every death inflicted by the only standing army in the fight is really a "civilian casualty".

I mean hell, in Iraq, we defeated Saddam's army in days, and since then, every "combatant" we kill is really a civilian. Not to mention that these "civilian combatants" attack from, organize and hide within, civilian areas. It is impossible to weed them out without hitting innocents.

Sucks.

[bread_and_roses]

6. We were not "forced to fight" in Iraq. Weapons can be banned,

The language of your post accepts that warring against whole populations is a legitimate policy and that the way it is is the way it has to be. Perhaps you ought to examine your assumptions.

[sugapablo]

7. Oh hush...

Nowhere in my post did I imply we were "forced to fight" in Iraq.

The only people "forced to fight" in Iraq were the soldiers who were shipped out when * made the biggest blunder in US Foreign Policy history.