CYIL 2012

DISARMAMENT AND HUMANITARIAN LAW IN CONVENTIONAL WEAPONS and on their Destruction 4 of 1997 . This Convention was concluded in extremely short time, in the period of one year, and also has a relation to the law of armed conflicts because it forbids also the use of mines. In 2008 the text of the Convention on Cluster Munitions was adopted. 5 In the theory of arms control D.V. Vagst 6 calls the arms number reduction a quantitative arms control, while the prohibition of certain means a qualitative arms control. 2. Prohibition of anti-personnel land mines The Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons Which May be Deemed to be Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects was signed in Geneva in 1980. 7 So far, five additional protocols were annexed to the Convention. Protocol II, which deals with land mines, is especially important. From the practical point of view it is the land mines which are considered to be the most dangerous and most frequently used form of conventional weapons that cause excessive injuries and suffering. These mines are laid to destroy tanks and vehicles (anti-tank mines) or persons. Namely the mines used against persons (anti-personnel mines) are quite dangerous. To activate them a force of only five to fifty kilograms is needed. G. Best states 8 that mines became in the 70s and 80s what napalm was in the 50s and 60s. Considering the effects of the use of mines, e.g. the statistics from Kampuchea in 1991 that nearly four million mines were laid and the results were catastrophic: 35 000 amputations and around 250-300 injuries caused by mines were recorded every month. 9 Restrictive prohibition of land mines is contained in Protocol II on prohibition or restriction on the use of mines, booby-traps and other devices. This Protocol is considered to be the most important result of negotiations which led to the signing of the Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons of 1980 and the protocols annexed to it. According to I. Detter 10 the interest in land mines grew in the 1960s and 70s, when booby-traps were used as a favorite weapon of terrorists. According to her, this use by terrorists explains why Protocol II, annexed to the Convention, was accepted. 4 Conf. Text Úmluvy in : vyhl. č. 29/2000 Sb.m.s. 5 Conf. Text Úmluvy in : Diplomatic Conference for Adoption of a Convention on Cluster Munitions. Dublin 19 ‐ 30 May 2008, CCM/77, 30 May 2008. 6 Conf. Vagst, D.V. The Hague Conventions and Arms Control. American Journal of International Law , 2000, vol. 94, no. 3, p. 31. 7 Conf. český text Úmluvy in: Potočný, M., Ondřej, J. Vybrané dokumenty ke studiu mezinárodního práva veřejného. V. díl. Praha : Univerzita Karlova, 1992, p. 80 a násl. 8 Conf. Best, G. War and Law since 1945 . Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994, p. 299. 9 Ibid. 10 Conf. Detter, I. The Law of War . Second edition. Cambridge.: Cambridge University Press, 2000, p. 218.

135