The United Nations is hoping for a global ban on cluster bombs as more than 100 nations gather in Dublin to finalise an anti-cluster munitions treaty.
Ad Melkert, associate administrator of the U.N. Development Program (UNDP), said there is a good chance that the conference, which starts on Monday and runs through May 30th, will end with the signing of a treaty outlawing cluster bombs.
"I see a momentum that warrants cautious optimism on what Dublin can bring about," Mr Melkert said. "There is an increasing awareness that leaving so many devices spread around is taking away the peace from people after conflicts, particularly for children," he added.
The top producers, users and stockpilers of cluster bombs - the United States, Israel, China, Russia, India and Pakistan - will not be at the conference, however.
"It is regrettable that the U.S. and a handful of other states continue to insist on their need to use a weapon that the rest of world is banning," said Steve Goose, director of the arms division at the New York-based Human Rights Watch.
But US allies such as Britain, Denmark, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands and Sweden are lobbying for the exclusion of some cluster bombs from the ban, diplomats said.
Cluster munitions open in mid-air and scatter as many as several hundred "bomblets" over wide areas. They often fail to explode, creating virtual mine fields that can kill or injure anyone who comes across them.
The UNDP says cluster munitions have caused more than 13,000 confirmed injuries and deaths around the world, the vast majority of them in Laos, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and Lebanon.