News

Lithuanian Permanent Representative to the United Nations Office and other international organizations in Geneva, Ambassador Eduardas Borisovas, began a Lithuanian chairmanship over the second annual conference on the Fifth Protocol on Explosive Remnants of War (Protocol V) of the United Nations Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons. The conference is taking place on 10-11 November in Geneva.

Signed in 2003, the fifth Protocol entered into force on 12 November 2006. The Protocol establishes the most important principles of humanitarian law in those areas, which are not directly covered by the Ottawa Convention on the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban and other Convention Protocols.

The duty of chairman was confided to Lithuania, who ratified the Protocol in 2004, with regard to the fact, that it actively contributes to the International Mine Action and promotes the principles of humanitarian law in the region and beyond.

By signing the Protocol, the States have committed themselves to remove, take away or destroy the explosives that had remained from the war, to register, store and transmit information about them to other countries. The provisions of the Protocol also oblige Member States to take measures to reduce the threat that explosives, remnants of war and other armed conflicts might cause and provides cooperation principles in assistance to combat the effects of eventual disaster.

In accordance with the definition in the Protocol, all explosives and ammunition, used during war or armed conflicts, but for some reason unexploded, are considered as explosive remnants of war. Military ammunition, left in a battlefield, and other explosives, which were not used for the purpose of fight, are also regarded as explosive remnants of war.