Summary: State Party Panama ratified the convention on 29 November 2010. It has participated in meetings of the convention, most recently in September 2018. Panama voted in favor of a key United Nations (UN) resolution on the convention in December 2018. It provided its transparency report for the convention in 2019, confirming it has never used, produced, transferred, or stockpiled cluster munitions.

Policy

The Republic of Panama signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008, ratified on 29 November 2010, and the convention entered into force for the country on 1 May 2011.

Panama has reported existing legislation under national implementation measures for the convention. Law 49 provides “legal and administrative measures” to “approve and implement” the Convention on Cluster Munitions, while the Criminal Code provides for penal sanctions for crimes against international human rights and humanitarian law. [1]

Panama provided its initial Article 7 transparency measures report for the convention in April 2019, covering the period 2011–2018. [2]

Panama participated in the Oslo Process and advocated for the strongest possible convention text during the Dublin negotiations in May 2008. [3]

Panama has participated in most of convention’s meetings, most recently the Eighth Meeting of States Parties in Geneva in September 2018, where it was appointed to coordinate the convention’s work to promote universalization. [4]

Panama voted in favor of a UN General Assembly (UNGA) resolution in December 2018, which urges states outside the Convention on Cluster Munitions to “join as soon as possible.” [5] It has voted in favor of the annual UNGA resolution promoting the convention since it was first introduced in 2015.

Panama has voted in favor of Human Rights Council (HRC) resolutions condemning the use of cluster munitions in Syria, most recently in July 2018. [6] It has also voted in favor of UNGA resolutions condemning the use of cluster munitions in Syria, most recently in December 2018. [7]

Panama has not expressed its views on certain important issues relating to its interpretation and implementation of the convention, such as the prohibition on transit, the prohibition on assistance during joint military operations with states not party that may use cluster munitions, the prohibition on foreign stockpiling of cluster munitions, the prohibition on investment in production of cluster munitions, and the need for retention of cluster munitions for training and development purposes.

Panama is party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is also party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons.

Use, production, transfer, and stockpiling

Panama has never used, produced, transferred, or stockpiled cluster munitions. [8]

Policy

The Republic of Panama signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 4 December 1997 and ratified it on 7 October 1998, becoming a State Party on 1 April 1999. Panama believes that existing legislation is sufficient to enforce the antipersonnel mine prohibition domestically.

Panama often attends meetings of the treaty, most recently the Seventeenth Meeting of States Parties in Geneva in November 2018 and the intersessional meetings of the treaty in Geneva in May 2019. Panama did not provide a statement at either meeting. Panama did not attend the Third Review Conference in Maputo in June 2014.

Panama submitted its third Article 7 report in 2009 and its fourth Article 7 report in 2019.

Panama is party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons and its Amended Protocol II on landmines and Protocol V on explosive remnants of war. It is also party to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.

Production, transfer, stockpile, and retention

Panama has never used, produced, exported, or imported antipersonnel mines, including for training purposes.

Panama has a problem with unexploded ordnance as a result of United States military exercises and weapons testing on military ranges in the Canal Zone during the three decades prior to 1999. Colombian rebels have also planted mines in Darien province, where two Panamanian border police were wounded in a mine blast in 2010. The number of devices found is unknown.[1]

Casualties

The last recorded casualties in the Republic of Panama were recorded in 2010 when two border policemen were injured on the Panama-Colombia border in an antipersonnel mine incident.[1]

The only other casualty recorded in Panama since 1999 was in 2004, when a farmer was reportedly killed by unexploded ordnance on a former United States military range in Colón province.[2]