34. National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1993, Public Law No. 102-484, sec. 1365. The implementing regulations appear at Federal Register, vol. 57 (November 25, 1992), p. 228. 35. Sec. 558 of the FY 1997 Foreign Operations Act, amended Sec. 1365 (c) of the National Defense Authorization Act for FY 1993. 36. White House, Statement by the Press Secretary, "United States Announces Next Steps on Anti-Personnel Landmines," January 17, 1997; conference call, Robert Bell, Senior Director for Defense Policy on Arms Control, National Security Council, with Human Rights Watch and other members of the U.S. Campaign to Ban Landmines, January 17, 1997. 37. Human Rights Watch Arms Project fact sheet, "Antipersonnel Landmine Exports," June 1996. Some other nations, such as Russia and Singapore, have only suspended export of certain types of mines, usually those that do not self-destruct. 38. Human Rights Watch and Physicians for Human Rights, Landmines: Deadly Legacy, p. 73.

The U.S. has also been one of the biggest exporters of antipersonnel mines. From 1969 through 1992, the U.S. exported 4.4 million antipersonnel mines to at least thirty-two different countries.34 The biggest recipients included Iran (2.5 million), Cambodia (622,000), Thailand (437,000), Chile (300,000) and El Salvador (102,000). It is also widely accepted that in the 1980s the U.S. covertly shipped significant numbers of antipersonnel mines to rebel groups in Afghanistan, Angola, Nicaragua and elsewhere. On October 23, 1992 President Bush signed into law a one-year moratorium on the export of all antipersonnel mines.35 The legislation had been introduced by Senator Patrick Leahy and Representative Lane Evans. The moratorium has subsequently been extended several times and is now effective, by law, until the year 2000.36 In its January 17, 1997 policy announcement, the Clinton Administration stated that the moratorium was henceforth to be considered a permanent ban, and that it would work with Senator Leahy to pass legislation to that effect. 37 More than fifty countries have now stated that they will not export antipersonnel mines. To the best of our knowledge, there have been no major exports of antipersonnel mines worldwide in more than two years. There is, in effect, a de facto global moratorium on antipersonnel mine exports. Only a handful of nations known to have exported in the past have yet to at least suspend transfers—Bosnia, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Serbia, and Vietnam.38

39. "Countries Which Purchased Munitions Containing Depleted Uranium as of 13 September 1995," obtained in 1996 by the Human Rights Watch Arms Project under a Freedom of Information Act request to the U.S. Department of the Army. 40. Manufacturers of antipersonnel mine dispenser systems are also included. Typically, new generation U.S. landmines are not hand emplaced. They are fired from special delivery systems on aircraft, artillery and other platforms.

The international drive to stop antipersonnel mine transfers has come at a propitious time. It appeared that a burgeoning and potentially very lucrative market in smart antipersonnel mines was emerging. Smart mines can cost fifty times more than dumb mines. From 1985 to 1992 at least five countries—Greece, South Korea, Taiwan, the Netherlands, and Turkey—imported U.S. manufactured scatterable antipersonnel landmines worth at least $24.7 million.39 U.S. ADAM smart antipersonnel mines containing depleted uranium were sold to the following countries: Greece (504 ADAM M692 projectiles worth $2.6 million); South Korea (645 ADAM M692 projectiles worth $3 million and 232 ADAM 731 projectiles worth $1 million); Turkey (320 ADAM M692 projectiles worth $2 million and 232 ADAM M731 projectiles worth $1.5 million); and Taiwan (72 ADAM M731 projectiles worth $360,000).40