US: The United States yesterday abandoned a sweeping land-mine prohibition envisioned by the Clinton administration in a move that angered humanitarian groups.
The new policy allows the use of sophisticated, or "smart", land mines that can be automatically defused within days, marking a retreat from the pledge to ban all land mines by 2006 if the Pentagon was able to develop alternatives.
It would ban after 2010 "dumb" mines that cannot self-destruct and pose a risk long after battlefields return to peaceful use.
The United States, which has refused to sign a global land-mine treaty, has long been criticised for its mine policies, and yesterday's announcement brought a sharp response.
"This new land-mine policy is not just a gigantic step backward for the United States, it is a complete about-face," said Mr Stephen Goose, executive director of the arms division of Human Rights Watch.
The charity Land Mine Action added: "While 141 countries around the world - including all other NATO countries - have now banned land mines, the US is choosing to continue to use this outmoded and indiscriminate weapon that kills and injures thousands of people every year."
President George Bush's special representative for mine action, Mr Lincoln Bloomfield, announcing the decision at the State Department, said it aimed to strike a balance between the need to retain effective weapons and humanitarian concerns.
Mines around the world posed a risk for 60 million civilians, and "dumb" mines caused an estimated 10,000 casualties a year, he said.
Senator Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, called the new policy a "deeply disappointing rollback" and said it would serve to encourage other militaries to continue using mines.
"The world looks to us for leadership on this issue," the senator said.
"When we back away from the progress that we have pledged to rid the world of these indiscriminate weapons, others will ask why they, with their much weaker armies, should stop using them." - (Reuters)