Summary: State Party Burundi was among the first 30 ratifications to trigger the convention’s entry into force on 1 August 2010. It has long expressed a desire to adopt national implementing legislation for the convention. Burundi has participated in all of the convention’s meetings and condemned the use of cluster munitions in 2015. According to its initial annual transparency report provided in 2011, Burundi has never used, produced, or transferred cluster munitions and has no stockpile, including for training or research purposes.

Policy

The Republic of Burundisigned the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008 and ratified on 25 September 2009. It was among the first 30 ratifications to trigger the convention’s entry into force on 1 August 2010.

Burundi has expressed its desire to enact national implementation legislation for the convention, but the exact status of legislative efforts was not known as of June 2016.[1] Previously, in 2013, a government official said that existing national implementation legislation for the Mine Ban Treaty would be amended to address cluster munitions.[2] In 2012, Burundi reported that the process of developing a legal framework to incorporate the convention’s provisions into national legislation would “soon be initiated.”[3] A group was convened in 2010 to draft the implementing legislation.[4] Burundi has reported that it has the national operational structure in place to implement the Convention on Cluster Munitions and related treaties.[5]

Burundi submitted its initial Article 7 transparency report for the convention in early 2011, but, as of 27 May 2016, had not provided any of the subsequent annual updates due by 30 April.[6] Burundi indicated in June 2015 that the updated report had been prepared and would soon be submitted.[7]

Burundi participated in the Oslo Process that led to the creation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions, including the formal negotiations in Dublin in May 2008 where it supported a comprehensive ban on cluster munitions.[8]

Burundi has continued to actively engage in the work of the Convention on Cluster Munitions. It has participated in every Meeting of States Parties of the convention and attended the Convention on Cluster Munitions First Review Conference in Dubrovnik, Croatia in September 2015. Burundi but it did not make a statement at the meeting. Burundi attended all intersessional meetings of the convention in Geneva, including the final ones in June 2015.

In June 2015, Burundi condemned the use of cluster munitions in Libya, Sudan, Syria, Ukraine, and Yemen and stated that the weapons should not be used “by anyone under any circumstance.” It called on the users and producers of cluster munitions to accede to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.[9]

On 7 December 2015, Burundi voted in favor of the first UN General Assembly (UNGA) resolution on the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which urges states outside the convention to “join as soon as possible.”[10] Burundi has also voted in favor of recent UNGA resolutions condemning the use of cluster munitions in Syria, most recently Resolution 69/189 on 18 December 2014, which expressed “outrage” at the continued use.[11]

Burundi has elaborated its views on certain important issues relating to the interpretation and implementation of the convention. In 2012, a Ministry of Public Security official said that Burundi considers assistance with prohibited acts in joint military operations to be prohibited by the convention and it also views the transit and foreign stockpiling of cluster munitions on or across the territories of States Parties to be prohibited.[12]

Burundi is a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is also party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons.

Use, production, transfer, and stockpiling

Burundi has stated that is has never used, produced, stockpiled, or transferred cluster munitions, nor has it any intention of acquiring them.[13] In 2011, Burundi declared that it has no stockpile of cluster munitions, including for training or research purposes.[14]