Summary

State Party Cape Verde ratified the convention on 19 October 2010. It last attended a meeting of the convention in 2012, but has voted in favor of a key annual United Nations (UN) resolutions promoting implementation of the convention since it was first introduced in 2015.

Cape Verde has not provided its initial transparency report for the convention, originally due in September 2011. This is required to formally confirm that Cape Verde never used, produced, transferred, or stockpiled cluster munitions.

Policy

The Republic of Cape Verde signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008, ratified on 19 October 2010, and the convention entered into force for the country on 1 April 2011.

Cape Verde has not explained if it has taken any national measures such as legislation to implement the convention.[1]

As of July 2021, Cape Verde still has not provided its initial Article 7 transparency report for the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which was originally due on 28 September 2011.

Cape Verde did not participate in the Oslo Process that created the convention before it signed in December 2008.

Cape Verde attended the convention’s meetings of States Parties in 2011 and 2012, but none since then. It was invited to, but did not attend the first part of the Second Review Conference held virtually in November 2020.

In December 2020, Cape Verde voted in favor of a key UN General Assembly (UNGA) resolution promoting the implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions.[2] It has voted in favor of the annual UNGA resolution on the convention since it was first introduced in 2015.

Cape Verde has also voted in favor of UNGA resolutions expressing outrage at the use of cluster munitions in Syria, most recently in December 2020.[3]

Cape Verde has not elaborated its views on important issues relating to the convention’s interpretation and implementation, such as the prohibition on transit and foreign stockpiling of cluster munitions on the territory of States Parties, the prohibition on assistance with prohibited acts in joint military operations, and the prohibition on investment in cluster munition production.

Cape Verde is a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is also party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW).

Use, production, transfer, and stockpiling

Cape Verde is not known to have ever used, produced, transferred, or stockpiled cluster munitions. To confirm its cluster munition-free status, Cape Verde must provide the UN with its transparency report for the convention.

Policy

The Republic of Cape Verde signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 4 December 1997 and ratified it on 14 May 2001, becoming a State Party on 1 November 2001. Legislation to enforce the antipersonnel mine prohibition domestically has not been enacted.

Cape Verde has not attended a meeting of the treaty since the intersessional Standing Committee meetings in June 2011. Cape Verde did not attend the Third Review Conference in Maputo in June 2014. Cape Verde submitted its initial Mine Ban Treaty Article 7 report on 31 March 2009, but has not submitted annual reports since.

Cape Verde is party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) and its Amended Protocol II on landmines, but not CCW Protocol V on explosive remnants of war. Cape Verde is party to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.

Production, use, stockpile, and transfer

Cape Verde has never used, produced, or exported antipersonnel mines. As part of a NATO training operation, Latvian explosive ordnance disposal troops destroyed Cape Verde’s stockpile of 1,471 antipersonnel mines in June 2006. Cape Verde’s deadline for destruction of stockpiled antipersonnel mines was 1 November 2005. Cape Verde retained 120 mines for training purposes.[1] It has not subsequently reported on the status of these mines.