United Nation's Deputy Secretary-General Dr. Asha-Rose Migiro on the opening day of a landmark meeting on cluster munitions in Vientiane. Lao PDR. Photo: UN Lao PDR/Laophoto

9 November—On the opening day of a landmark meeting on cluster munitions, the UN applauded the international leadership of the Government of the Lao PDR as it hosts and takes on the Presidency of a convention for the first time to advance the global disarmament, humanitarian and development agenda. 

“The Convention on Cluster Munitions is a critical step toward ridding the world of cluster weapons, which are indiscriminate and inhumane” stated United Nation’s Deputy Secretary-General Dr. Asha-Rose Migiro in her keynote address to the meeting.  “For more than half a century these weapons have robbed the lives and limbs from the people of Laos.”  

Lao PDR is a country which knows first-hand the very heavy burden of contamination with cluster munitions and countless other explosive remnants of war – with every one of its 14 provinces affected.  It was one of the first nation states to sign the Convention on Cluster Munitions, which now has 108 signatories.  Today Laos is host to the largest ever international meeting to be undertaken by the Government - attended by 118 nation states and over 550 representatives of civil society organizations from around the world.