The UK government has reaffirmed its commitment to the Ottawa Convention, the international treaty banning anti-personnel landmines, amid growing concern over the recent decisions by some of its closest NATO allies to abandon the agreement in response to Russia’s escalating military threat.
In a written parliamentary response to Labour peer Lord Spellar on 1 April 2025, Defence Minister Lord Coaker stated that the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines continues to play an “important role in protecting civilians from harm caused by anti-personnel landmines.”
The UK, he said, remains fully committed to the treaty and is actively encouraging other countries to join, comply with, and uphold its provisions.
The reaffirmation comes after Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland—four NATO allies on the front line of tensions with Russia—publicly announced their intentions to withdraw from the Ottawa Convention. These moves follow Russia’s continued military aggression in Ukraine and concerns over the changing nature of conventional warfare, particularly the utility of landmines in deterring or delaying large-scale armoured advances.
Acknowledging the shift, Lord Coaker noted that the UK “shares concerns about the security environment in the region as a result of Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine.” However, he added, “it is the sovereign right of those countries to make this decision.”
Despite understanding the rationale behind their withdrawal, the UK government is concerned about the wider impact on global disarmament norms and has pledged to work with international partners to mitigate the consequences. “The UK will work to mitigate impacts on vital arms control and disarmament norms, while continuing to engage bilaterally on the actions States plan to take,” said Lord Coaker.
The UK has long positioned itself as a global advocate of the Ottawa Treaty, having destroyed its stockpile of anti-personnel mines decades ago and contributing actively to global mine clearance operations. However, the growing divide within NATO on the issue reflects the evolving pressures on international treaties under the strain of geopolitical instability.
While no UK policy shift is currently being considered, increased use of mines in Ukraine, combined with Russian tactics of attritional warfare and territorial occupation, has led some NATO members to reassess previously held commitments.
Mistake, surely mines are better to use than contemplating tactical nukes.
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Should never have been signed.
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A treaty not worth the paper it is written on, same as cluster munitions. Soon as the temperature rises no one would be stupid each to tie their own arms behind their back
Problem is, by the time we realize we need them it will be too late to make or get them.
Our leadership are that stupid and are excellent at cutting our own noses off. There are endless clues; economy, tax, policing, border controls, environment
Another idiotic commitment by this government
Ciaker and Eagle are both useless with no military understanding. We need such munitions and soon. Russia has them and would use them. Otherwise Labour give us tactical nukes again via the RAF….
UK government would rather see our troops die. Complete idiots. Wars aren’t won by being nice.
I can’t help feel that this is a mistake. We shouldn’t be averse to using landmines to stop the Russians. Same with cluster munitions.
Indeed. The new geopolitical reality necessitates being able to generate as much firepower across all domains as possible. Cluster munitions are a very effective contributor to that.
Our government is forever doing things like this- clinging to treaty commitments that place us at a disadvantage even as it becomes clear that the wider world is abandoning them, and the rational thing to do is cut and run. ‘Prioritise UK national interest’ doesn’t seem to be a concept that our policy-makers understand.
At the end of the day it’s pretty irrelevant to the UK because we are not defending a frontier or going to be engaged in static warfare. Any land warfare we will be engaged in will be supporting someone else’s army on someone else’s land. They will mine their own land with permanent anti personal mines if they so wish we would clearly not do that.
What most people forget is this does not actually stop the Uk using command controlled defensive mines such as claymores with command controls so you can still set defensive mines that are time limited and under threat control of a person.
A clarity amongst many foggy viewpoints.
The fact that we wouldn’t be mining our own land illustrates that we have little to lose by resuming the use of AP mines, and it is never good practice in a military alliance to seek to undermine your allies’ military capabilities. Someone still needs to manufacture AP mines if our allies want them, even if they aren’t deployed on our territory. Presumably we won’t be contributing our industrial capacity to that aspect of NATO’s collective defence. So we miss out on a potential commercial opportunity and we fail to optimise the capabilities of the alliance at the same time. Still- since the US has never been a signatory anyway I’m sure they’ll be happy to supply Poland and the Baltics in whatever quantity the latter are willing to pay for. So much for ‘European unity’.
It isn’t our decision whether our allies’ land gets mined or not, or shouldn’t be, anyway.
If they are willing to leave automatic land mines in fields and towns they can, but us turning up and laying explosives all over other peoples’ homes rather undermines the point of defending them.
To be honest Ian persistent AP mines are a scourge I would much rather our industrial capacity went into making 155mm shells and Precision munitions like cruise missile production.
In the end if we can produce and launch cruise missiles at an enemy at a constant rate that is a profoundly important industrial capability for the UK.. if the Uk and Russia ever got into a pissing match our ability to launch cruise missiles at them would be the difference in what sort of peace deal we agreed.
There are some very important industrial capabilities…building persistent anti personnel mines is not one of them..let other eat that moral shite burger pill…
Let’s focus our attention on the weapon systems the UK needs and don’t expend or not political capital on system that are not core to us…
Actually the US follows the Ottawa convention in every way, other than on the Korean boarder… it’s the only reason it never signed the convention.. it has fixed defences in an unresolved war facing an enemy army. But the US has and follows the following:
“The United States aligns its policy concerning use” of anti-personnel landmines (APLs) “outside of the Korean Peninsula” with key provisions of The Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-personnel Mines and on Their Destruction—commonly known as the Ottawa Convention” congressional research service.
More proof if it were needed that Starmer and co still don’t think there is an imminent realistic threat to Europe from Russia. All posture and no fight.
As a serving soldier when this stupid ban (thanks lady Di)was introduced we were not impressed at all with a means of defence being stripped away!
Of course we won’t pull out of the treaty, it would be something else they’d have to pay for…
What about HMG’s obligation to protect the personnel of the British armed forces who they have sent into harms way ?
Ridiculous decision. Times have changed since we signed that treaty. In my opinion it was the right decision at the time to sign that treaty buy we live in a more dangerous world and our army needs landmines.
Simply a luxury decision made by those of no military experience and born out of deluded self righteousness that would go out the window as soon as a real war started.
If I was operating at a Company or Battalion forward base on some hilltop. I would like to think we would have a perimeter barbed wired but also in front of that a mine field. UK military still uses M18A1 Anti-Personnel Mine. It is used primarily in ambushes and as an anti-infiltration against enemy infantry also for specialist and defensive purposes. So in reality GB Forces are trained to use The Claymore Anti Personnel Mines. Back in the cold war days I did an Assault Pioneers course, where I was shown how to use these.
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The UK seems out of step on an increasing number of fronts. We are still cutting defence capability, by retiring systems without replacement, whilst other NATO countries are actively building up their forces. Even the much heralded increase in spending is too litte, too late, and largely just a puff of smoke…….
I think at this point that cluster munitions like DPICM are more ‘important’ than land mines, although both are powerful defensive tools.
I personally don’t think that a convention on landmines is a problem, but the Ottawa convention in particular just went too far; we’re now in a position where we can produce these weapons with an acceptable dud rate- which was always the real problem with them in the first place. But Ottawa was just a blanket ban. We need to take the approach the US has, in putting a minimum acceptable dud rate in the specification for the stuff they order and get on with stockpiling.