New Zealand

Mine Ban Policy

Last updated: 18 December 2019

Policy

New Zealand signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 3 December 1997 and ratified it on 27 January 1999, becoming a State Party on 1 July 1999. Legislation to enforce the antipersonnel mine prohibition domestically was enacted on 9 December 1998.[1]

New Zealand regularly attends meetings of the treaty, including the Third Review Conference in Maputo in June 2014, and more recently the Seventeenth Meeting of States Parties in Geneva in November 2018, where it provided statements on Article 5 clearance and universalization of the convention.[2] New Zealand also attended the intersessional meetings in Geneva in May 2019.

New Zealand served on the Standing Committees on the General Status and Operation of the Convention (2003–2005, 2013–2014) and Victim Assistance (2006–2008).

On 5 December 2018, New Zealand voted in favor of UN General Assembly resolution 73/61 promoting universalization and implementation of the convention, as it has done in previous years.[3]

New Zealand 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 destruction, and retention

New Zealand has never produced or exported antipersonnel mines but used them in limited quantities during World War II and the Korean War; operational use was prohibited in 1996. New Zealand destroyed its small stockpile of surplus training/practice mines in 1997.

New Zealand imported antipersonnel mines from the United States, and perhaps other nations.[4]



[1] The Anti-Personnel Mines Prohibition Act of 1998. The law makes engaging in prohibited activity an offence, punishable by imprisonment for a term not exceeding seven years or a fine not exceeding NZ$500,000 (approximately US$250,000).

[2] Statement of New Zealand, Mine Ban Treaty Seventeenth Meeting of States Parties, Geneva, 29 November 2018; and statement of New Zealand, Mine Ban Treaty Seventeenth Meeting of States Parties, Geneva, 30 November 2018.

[3] “Implementation of the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on Their Destruction,” UNGA Resolution 73/61, 5 December 2018.

[4] US Army records show that New Zealand imported 5,634 M18A1 Claymore mines from 1969–1988. Another government source indicates that the US shipped 6,486 antipersonnel mines to New Zealand, including 4,800 mines in the period 1983–1992, but there is no breakdown of mine type.