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TechnoratiAfghan Teenage Cluster Bomb Victim Battling For Ban
Afghan teenager Soraj Ghulam Habib, whose legs were blown off by a cluster bomb, is campaigning hard for a ban on such lethal munitions that would spare other children from his tragic fate.
A 10-year-old boy when the unexploded bomblet left him close to death, Habib, now 17 and wheelchair-bound, is in Dublin to press officials from 109 countries who have gathered to thrash out a landmark ban on cluster bombs.
The conference, due to conclude on May 30, is aiming for a wide-ranging international pact that would completely eliminate the use, production, transfer and stockpiling of cluster munitions among signatories.
Habib's childhood curiosity with a funny-looking object left him a whisker from death, yet another innocent civilian victim of deadly cluster bombs.
"One day, I went out with some of my cousins for a picnic in a public park," the softly-spoken teenager, from Herat province in north-western Afghanistan, told AFP through a Dari-speaking interpreter.
"It was the beginning of New Year in Afghanistan and on the way home, on the sidewalk, I saw a yellow can. I picked it up and wanted to open it. When I threw it down, it exploded."
The same colour as the emergency food parcels air-dropped by US planes, the yellow can was in fact a BLU-97, a sub-munition dropped in a cluster bomb during the US aerial bombing campaign to oust the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
"It's a dangerous weapon but it looks nice, it looks very interesting to a child," he said.
Taken to hospital, the doctors wanted to give the 10-year-old a lethal injection, judging that his life was not worth living given the extent of his injuries.
"He said to my father, 'it's not good for his future life to be like this, let's let him die,'" Habib said.
But the boy's father disagreed and the youth was operated on. A week later, a small piece of sub-munition was found in his stomach, which had entered his body through his leg. Again, the medics operated.
After four months, he was allowed to return home, with daily visits from the doctors. Further operations followed.
The physical horror of his ordeal is visible, but the emotional and social damage is not.
Leaving hospital, the destruction of his childhood became clear.
"Cluster munitions injure but also do not lead us to be in society," Habib said.
"I wanted to go outside and play with my friends, but they did not want to play with me. They said that now I was a wheelchair user, I was not able to do anything."
Fighting his corner, his uncle pushed for him to be allowed in school.
"It was a social problem that nobody would play with me," he said.
"I had a lot of dreams, to do for my friends, my family, my community and my country; it destroyed all my dreams and all my wishes."
He is not the only one whose childhood has been wrecked by cluster bombs. Campaigners say they disproportionately affect civilians, with Handicap International estimating that 60 percent of civilian casualties are children.
"There are a lot of people affected by cluster munitions in Afghanistan, especially in Herat," Habib said.
"In my rehabilitation centre, one of my classmates also lost both his legs."
Habib is clear about the outcome he wants from the talks at Croke Park stadium in Dublin.
"I'm calling on all the states, especially those here, to stop it, join with us and let the children have peace and a life without cluster munitions.
"I hope from this conference that we come out with good results to save future lives," he said.
"It's the responsibility of those countries ... save the lives of children and give them a brilliant future."
Habib now works in Herat with the Kabul-based ALSO, the Afghan Landmine Survivors' Organisation.
"I try to bring back the dreams I had before: to work hard and offer the help that I can to my people, my community and my country," he said.
© 2008 Agence France Presse
14 Comments so far
Show AllThe secret ulterior motive behind cluster-bomb use is paying-off select victims to pretend that they had their arms or legs amputated by barbaric religious fundamentalists. There's no better psyops propaganda than the kind that is used as evidence against under-privileged, poor, third-world peoples sitting on valuable resources just waiting to be stolen and exploited by imperial corporate fascists. All the fascists need to steal such land and resources is the green-light to murder the people that live there.
Nothing works better to give the fascists the green-light than some very substantial evidence that the people are being oppressed by an uncivilized, barbaric government. The CIA has been paying land-mine and cluster-bomb victims to pretend they had their limbs amputated by religious fundies for decades and even the humanitarian rights groups have been fooled.
Does everyone understand by now, the Zionist's whore Hillary--- voted AGAINST the ban on cluster bombs in civilian areas?
Greatbear, you're right, but war is profitable for the greedy and evil people. One of the (many) reasons I'd never vote for Hillary Clinton or John McCain is that they are against the ban of cluster bombs. Both Hillary and McCain are dangerous to the survival of the planet. They're itching to bomb Iran to oblivion (for Israel, of course).
War is never the answer; I don't care what the purported reason is-war-is-never-the-answer.
Yellow is the color of cowardice -- and cowardice it is to kill from a distance, to sneak in the shadows.
K'paa!
-- Lt. Worf
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article3818771.ece
Arvy May - This is the news which our media is reluctant to share with us. Here in the UK, there has been nothing on the television, and you have to look beyond the front page. So many people are not aware of this. I believe that they should have this forced on them, to see what their governments are doing, to see the obscene aftermath which these weapons cause.
To talk of Iran, Syria or Korea as the largest state sponsors of terrorism in the World is ludicrous.
The US, UK and Israel, who have all been responsible for the deaths of millions of innocent civilians are terrorist states, and I am ashamed to belong to one of them.
Ditto Reuters
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSL0434078820080522?sp=true
"Eight civilians have been killed in a strike by US military helicopters north of Baghdad, Iraqi police have said.
Two children were among those who died in the air attack on Wednesday evening near the town of Baiji, they said." -BBC
Is it not high time that executive heads start to roll at the corporate offices of those that make these childkilling WMDs? What inhuman sadists make Hellfire missles and what running dog's offspring would use these things on civilians time after time after time?
Someone should make a television advertisement with Habib and other children maimed by cluster bombs and landmines asking John McCain and Hillary Clinton to change their position on this important ethical issue.
If the manufacturers and the exporters of these munitions, and the politicians who sanction their use, were made legally and financially responsible for their unintended consequences (innocent civilians), the production of them would stop immediately.
For too long the armament industry and war-mongering politicians have got away with murder.
P.S. The brain: rubbish in - rubbish out! Check my blog.
"WASHINGTON (AP) — A senior U.S. official said Wednesday that a proposed treaty banning cluster bombs would hurt world security and endanger U.S. military cooperation on humanitarian work with countries that sign the accord.
Stephen Mull, an assistant secretary of state, briefed reporters at the State Department to explain why the United States was not attending a gathering in Ireland of representatives of more than 100 nations working on a treaty to ban the bombs blamed for killing or maiming civilians as their mini-bombs explode months or years after they are dropped."
This WMD ban would conflict with the US/Israeli 'No Child Left Unmaimed' policy. How many millions of these little devils have Americans dropped on Iraq and Afghanistan or how many did the Jews drop on the people of Lebanon in the Bush/Olmert failed blitzkreg?
This is a horrifying story. If it doesn't convince the US to ban cluster bombs, then if there is a God we really are damned.
Her refusing to ban cluster bombs is the most important difference between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, at least as far as I'm concerned.
It's interesting to note that, in addition to this Agence France Presse article, results for "cluster bomb" under Google's news tab turn up stories datelined Switzerland, UK, South Africa, The Vatican, Macau and most other places on earth. But guess how many were found that show any U.S. press source. That's right. None.
Persistent weapons are those that leave lingering effects on the battlefield. Agent Orange is one example of this type of weapons, which are specifically banned under the Geneva Convention and Treaties of the Hague.
Depleted Uranium is another weapon that can remain in a state of dormancy for decades due to its radioactive half-life. Unfortunately the particles of exploded DU are microscopic and can drift in the upper atmosphere like fallout. See this excellent interview of Sister Bertell.
Special legal rules apply to persistent weapons with lingering effects for good reason. Making their use a war crime--criminal offense--have been added to treaties that we've signed. Continued use of cluster bomb munitions and Depleted Uranium is illegal and prosecutable under international law statutes. Our leaders must also understand the spirit of Nuremburg which held accountable those who launched wars under false pretense, also a crime.