Congo, Republic of

Cluster Munition Ban Policy

Last updated: 26 June 2017

Summary: State Party Congo ratified the convention on 2 September 2014. It has prepared draft implementing legislation for the convention that requires Cabinet approval before it can be introduced in parliament. Congo has participated in meetings of the convention, most recently in 2015, and voted in favor of a UN resolution on the convention in December 2016. It has elaborated its views on several important issues relating to the interpretation and implementation of the convention. Congo states that it has never used, produced, or transferred cluster munitions, and does not stockpile them or possess any for training or research purposes. It has yet to formally confirm this by submitting its initial transparency report.

Policy

The Republic of the Congo(Congo-Brazzaville) signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008, ratified on 2 September 2014, and the convention entered into force for the country on 1 March 2015.

Congo is believed to be preparing domestic implementing legislation for the convention. In September 2015, Congo informed States Parties that it is reviewing the national implementation measures required to enforce the convention’s provisions.[1] Its representative told the Cluster Munition Coalition (CMC) that Congo has drafted implementing legislation that will require Cabinet approval before it can be introduced in parliament.[2]

As of 20 June 2017, Congo has not yet submitted its initial Article 7 transparency report for the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which was originally due by 28 August 2015.

Congo attended several meetings of the Oslo Process that created the Convention on Cluster Munitions, and joined in the consensus adoption of the convention in Dublin in May 2008.[3]

Congo has participated in all of the convention’s Meetings of States Parties and the First Review Conference with the exception of the Sixth Meeting of States Parties held in Geneva in September 2016. Congo participated in intersessional meetings in Geneva in 2011 and 2014.

At the First Review Conference, Congo expressed the gratitude of its president, Dénis Sassou Nguesso, for a letter he received from the CMC praising Congo’s active support for the convention, describing the correspondence as “an encouragement to continue the policy of peace that leads our government.”[4]

Congo voted in favor of a UN General Assembly (UNGA) resolution on implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions in December 2016.[5]

Congo has expressed deep concern at the use of cluster munitions in Syria.[6]

Congo is party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is not party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons.

Interpretive issues

In 2013, Congo elaborated its views on several important issues concerning interpretation and implementation of the convention. Congo’s National Mine Action Focal Point informed the Monitor that Congo “is not willing to assist any country with prohibited acts” under the convention, nor “to use its national territory for transit of these weapons or the stockpiling of cluster munitions and landmines belonging to a foreign army.”[7] The official also informed the Monitor that Congo agreed with the views of a number of States Parties to the convention and of the CMC that investment in the production of cluster munitions is also prohibited by the convention.[8]

Use, production, transfer, and stockpiling

Congo stated in 2011 that it has never used, produced, or exported cluster munitions.[9]

Congo also stated that it has no stockpiles of cluster munitions on its territory, including for training or research purposes.[10] However in 2010, Congo reported that the possession of stocks of Soviet-era cluster munitions that were supplied for use with MiG-21 aircraft.[11] In September 2011, Congo informed States Parties that following the attack on a central arms depot in Maya-Maya during the 1997–1998 conflict, explosive weapons consisting mainly of Soviet OFAB unitary aircraft bombs, RBK-250 and RBK-500 cluster bombs, mortars, artillery shells, and C-250 rockets were dispersed over an area of more than 0.26km2, making the territory inaccessible for the local population. After the end of the conflict, the area was abandoned without being marked.[12] After an accident in May 2011, a demining unit of the Congolese armed forces cleared the depot site in cooperation with humanitarian demining NGO Mines Advisory Group (MAG), destroying unexploded ordnance (UXO) including PTAB-2.5M and AO-1SCh submunitions.[13]

Cluster munitions were not found among unexploded ordnance resulting from a disastrous series of explosions at a munitions storage depot in Brazzaville on 4 March 2012 that killed more than 200 people and injured more than 1,500.[14]



[1] Statement of Congo, Convention on Cluster Munitions First Review Conference, Dubrovnik, 8 September 2015.

[2] Interview with Col. Jean-Aimé Ignoumba, Acting Director-General for Strategic Affairs and Military Cooperation, Dubrovnik, 7 September 2015.

[3] For details on Congo’s cluster munition policy and practice up to early 2009, see Human Rights Watch and Landmine Action, Banning Cluster Munitions: Government Policy and Practice (Ottawa: Mines Action Canada, May 2009), pp. 61–62.

[4] Statement of Congo, Convention on Cluster Munitions First Review Conference, Dubrovnik, 8 September 2015.

[5]Implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions,” UNGA Resolution 71/45, 5 December 2016. It voted in favor of a similar UNGA resolution in 2015. See, “Implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions,” UNGA Resolution 70/54, 7 December 2015.

[6] Statement of Congo, UNGA First Committee on Disarmament and International Security, New York, 14 October 2013.

[7] Interview with Col. Nkoua, National Focal Point of the Struggle Against Mines, 13 May 2013.

[8] Telephone interview with Col. Nkoua, National Focal Point of the Struggle Against Mines, 8 June 2013.

[9] Statement of Congo, Convention on Cluster Munitions Second Meeting of States Parties, Beirut, 15 September 2011.

[10] In September 2011, Congo stated that it had no stockpiles of cluster munitions on its territory. In May 2013, Congo reported that it had destroyed its remaining 372 antipersonnel mines held for training and research purposes following the massive explosions in a weapons depot in Brazzaville in March 2012 and was now a country fully free of landmines and cluster munitions. Statement of Congo, Convention on Cluster Munitions Second Meeting of States Parties, Beirut, 15 September 2011; statement by Col. Nkoua, National Focal Point of the Struggle Against Mines, Seminar to mark the 20th Anniversary of the ICBL hosted by the Congolese Campaign to Ban Landmines and Cluster Bombs, Kinshasa, 19 December 2012; and statement of Congo, Lomé Regional Seminar on the Universalization of the Convention on Cluster Munitions, Lomé, Togo, 22 May 2013. Notes by Action on Armed Violence (AOAV).

[11] Email from Lt.-Col. André Pampile Serge Oyobe, Head of Information Division, Ministry of Defense, 13 July 2010.

[12] Statement of Congo, Convention on Cluster Munitions Second Meeting of States Parties, Beirut, 15 September 2011.

[13] Ibid. Cluster munitions were also apparently part of weapons stockpiles destroyed in 2008–2010 with the assistance of United Kingdom-based humanitarian demining organization MAG. Email from Lt.-Col. Oyobe, Ministry of Defense, 13 July 2010.

[14] An assessment found that cluster munitions were not found among the UXO or other stockpiled munitions in the depot. Simon Conway, “Mpila Munitions Depot Explosion, Brazzaville, Republic of Congo, Field Assessment 26 March 2012 – 1 April 2012”; and AOAV and MAG, “Brazzaville Response Situation Report 2,” 16 March 2012.