Guinea-Bissau
Cluster Munition Ban Policy
Summary: State Party Guinea-Bissau ratified the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 29 November 2010. It participated in the convention’s Tenth Meeting of States Parties in August–September 2022. Guinea-Bissau voted in favor of the key United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution promoting the convention in December 2022.
Guinea-Bissau provided an initial Article 7 transparency report for the convention in November 2019, which confirmed that it has never produced cluster munitions. In May 2022, Guinea-Bissau clarified that it does not possess any stockpiled cluster munitions, including for research and training purposes.
Policy
The Republic of Guinea-Bissau signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008 and ratified it on 29 November 2010. It became a State Party on 1 May 2011.
Guinea-Bissau has not reported any national implementing legislation for the Convention on Cluster Munitions.[1]
Guinea-Bissau submitted its initial Article 7 transparency report for the convention in November 2019, and provided four annual updated annual reports in 2020–2023.[2]
Guinea-Bissau participated in some meetings of the Oslo Process that created the convention, including the formal negotiations in Dublin in May 2008, where it joined other African states in opposing efforts to weaken the convention text and participated in the consensus adoption of the text.[3]
Guinea-Bissau attended the convention’s intersessional meetings in May 2022 and provided an update on stockpiles. This marked its first participation in a meeting of the convention since 2014.[4] Most recently, it participated in the convention’s Tenth Meeting of States Parties held in Geneva in August–September 2022, where it reiterated that it does not possess any cluster munitions.[5]
Guinea-Bissau voted in favor of the key UNGA resolution promoting full implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions in December 2022.[6]It has voted in favor of the annual UNGA resolution promoting the convention since it was first introduced in 2015.
Guinea-Bissau has not elaborated its views on certain important issues relating to the interpretation and implementation of the convention, such as the prohibitions on transit; on assistance during joint military operations with states not party that may use cluster munitions; on foreign stockpiling of cluster munitions; and on investment in cluster munition production.
Guinea-Bissau is a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is also party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW).
Use, production, and transfer
Guinea-Bissau said in 2008 that it has never used or produced cluster munitions.[7] In its initial transparency report provided in November 2019, Guinea-Bissau confirmed that it has no cluster munition production facilities.
Guinea-Bissau is not known to have exported cluster munitions, but may have imported them in the past.
Stockpile destruction
Guinea-Bissau clarified in 2022 that it does not possess any cluster munition stockpiles.
Guinea-Bissau initially reported that it possessed cluster munitions but did not provide information on the types or quantities.[8] Guinea-Bissau sought financial and technical assistance to identify and safely destroy cluster munition stocks by the convention’s 1 May 2019 deadline.[9] An assessment of Guinea-Bissau’s storage facilities conducted in January 2020 by the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD) did not identify any cluster munitions.[10]
In May 2022, Guinea-Bissau told the convention’s intersessional meetings that the Ministry of National Defense recently carried out a verification exercise to confirm the existence of cluster munitions, which concluded that Guinea-Bissau “does not have any reserves of such ammunition under its jurisdiction or control.”[11]
Guinea-Bissau confirmed that it does not stockpile cluster munitions in its recent transparency reports and it has any not retained any for research or training purposes.[12]
[1] Guinea-Bissau Convention on Cluster Munitions Article 7 Report, Form A, January 2021. Previously, in January 2020, Guinea-Bissau reported that it was in the process of drafting national implementation legislation for the convention. Guinea-Bissau Convention on Cluster Munitions Article 7 Report, Form A, 1 January 2020. See, Convention on Cluster Munitions Article 7 Database. Previously, an official said the country’s Penal Code provides sanctions for any violations of the Convention on Cluster Munitions. Statement of Guinea-Bissau, Lomé Regional Seminar on the Universalization of the Convention on Cluster Munitions, Lomé, 23 May 2013.
[2] Guinea-Bissau’s initial Article 7 report covers the period 1 May 2011 to 21 November 2019. It was originally due by 28 October 2011.
[3] For details on Guinea-Bissau’s policy and practice regarding cluster munitions through early 2009, see Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Landmine Action, Banning Cluster Munitions: Government Policy and Practice (Ottawa: Mines Action Canada, May 2009), pp. 86–87.
[4] Guinea-Bissau participated in the convention’s Meetings of States Parties in 2010–2014 and intersessional meetings in 2011–2015.
[5] Statement of Guinea-Bissau, Convention on Cluster Munitions Tenth Meeting of States Parties, Geneva, 31 August 2023.
[6] “Implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions,” UNGA Resolution 77/79, 7 December 2022.
[7] Statement by Amb. Augusto Artur António Silva, Secretary of State and International Cooperation, Convention on Cluster Munitions Signing Conference, Oslo, 4 December 2008.
[8] Guinea-Bissau Convention on Cluster Munitions Article 7 Report, Form B, 1 January 2020; and statement of Guinea-Bissau, Convention on Cluster Munitions Fifth Meeting of States Parties, San Jose, 3 September 2014. Guinea-Bissau told States Parties that it had asked for help to destroy its stockpile in 2013 from the United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS). UNMAS had conducted a technical assessment in 2011, which found the cluster munition stocks were held by the armed forces “in very bad conditions.” See, statement of Guinea-Bissau, Convention on Cluster Munitions Fourth Meeting of States Parties, Lusaka, 11 September 2013. A 2011 inventory review by the National Mine Action Coordination Center (Centro Nacional de Coordenação da Acção Anti-Minas, CAAMI) found that an air force base in Bissau city held stocks of cluster munitions. Interview with César Luis Gomes Lopes de Carvalho, General Director, CAAMI, in Geneva, 27 June 2011. RBK-series air-dropped bombs and PTAB-2.5 submunitions were among munitions ejected by an explosion at an ammunition storage facility on the outskirts of Bissau city in 2000. See, Cleared Ground Demining, “Guinea Bissau,” undated.
[9] Ibid.
[10] GICHD, “To assist the Guinea-Bissau authorities in the identification of suspected cluster munitions,” Project No. 91023, 11–17 January 2020. According to the report, GICHD Ammunition Management Advisory Team (AMAT) technical experts were provided “access to all ammunition stores in Guinea Bissau…[to be] shown…the bombs suspected of being cluster munitions.” The team visited storage facilities in the capital Bissau city, and in Gabú and Nhala. They reviewed weapons held by the armed forces, the Ministry of the Interior, and the national police. The AMAT experts identified old Soviet-made OFAB and FAB bombs and incendiary weapons (eighteen RBK ZAB-series bombs) but no cluster munitions. According to the report, “Disappointment was expressed at not being shown either the suspected cluster munitions or any stores of current operational and training ammunition.”
[11] Statement of Guinea-Bissau, Convention on Cluster Munitions intersessional meetings, Geneva, 19 May 2022.
[12] Guinea-Bissau Convention on Cluster Munitions Article 7 Report, Form B, 1 January 2023.