(Reuters) -Poland is ready to start work on resuming the production of anti-personnel mines, its defence minister said on Thursday, after Warsaw joined the Baltic states this week in announcing a plan to withdraw from a treaty that bans their use.
Quitting the 1997 Ottawa Convention, which has been ratified or acceded to by more than 160 nations, will allow Poland and the three Baltic republics to start stockpiling and using anti-personnel mines again, part of their response to what they say is a rising threat from Russia.
“Poland and our neighbors cannot be limited by conventions that in some way hinder our deterrence or defence policy,” Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz told a press conference, when asked about plans to withdraw from the Ottawa Convention.
“The role of politicians is to undo the corset which has been put on the military today and we as Poland and our allies from the Baltic states are doing so,” he added.
Kosiniak-Kamysz said that passing legislation to pull out of the Ottawa Convention would take several months and that another six months would be needed to implement this at the United Nations.
“Also, obtaining the ability to produce these mines is a task for the arms industry,” he said, adding that he had information that there was readiness to do so.
Polish arms company Belma told Reuters by email that it already produces anti-tank mines and could re-equip its machinery in a short time.
However, Charles Bechara from the International Campaign to Ban Landmines – Cluster Munition Coalition said reintroducing anti-personnel mine production could be expensive and difficult.
“Even if pursued, it would take years to operationalise, diverting resources from the development of modern and more effective defence measures,” he said.
Cordula Droege, Chief Legal Officer of the International Committee of the Red Cross, told reporters she believed countries were taking “rash” decisions and sounded caution about what this could mean in the future.
“You have to ask the question: how far does it go? Because will the next thing be: yeah we actually need chemical weapons… Is that then acceptable and do you then leave the chemical weapons convention?”
(Reporting by Karol Badohal, Olivia Le Poidevin, Emma Farge, Editing by William Maclean)
