Ukraine Sees Highest Cluster Munition Toll for Third Year

A man walks in front of a crater left by an explosion during escalating conflict in Kyiv, Ukraine. (file)

The Ukrainian conflict has recorded the highest confirmed death and injury toll from cluster munitions for the third consecutive year, UN-backed researchers said on Monday.

According to the latest Cluster Munitions Monitor, more than 1,200 people have been killed or maimed in Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. The true figure is likely much higher, but it could take years before an accurate number is known, said Loren Persi, team lead for the Cluster Munition Monitor report.

Citing conflicts in Syria and Yemen, where high casualty figures only became clear years later, Persi told journalists in Geneva, “This only came out [years] later.”

In Lao People’s Democratic Republic, described by Persi as the most contaminated country by cluster munitions, it took decades before surveys confirmed estimates that many thousands of people had been killed or injured. Cluster munitions are containers from which submunitions are scattered.

The civil society publication, backed by the UN disarmament research agency UNIDIR, notes Israeli claims that cluster munitions were used in a ballistic missile attack by Iran in June 2025, along with reported but unverified use in Gaza and southern Lebanon.

The report also highlights the use of “domestically produced” air-delivered cluster bombs by de facto forces in Myanmar since around 2022 amid the ongoing civil war. Schools have been targeted in rebel-held areas, including Chin, Rakhine, Kachin, and the Saigon region, according to Monitor research specialist Michael Hart.

Submunitions, or bomblets, cause casualties and damage through blast impact, incendiary effects, and fragmentation. A single attack can involve thousands of individual explosives scattered over hundreds of square metres. UNIDIR explained that while cluster munitions can target armour, materiel, and personnel, civilians continue to bear the brunt of their effects, Persi said.

As in previous years, children accounted for 42 per cent of casualties in 2024, often mistaking submunitions for toys while playing, going to school, or working in fields.

Cuts in humanitarian funding have slowed clearance of contaminated land in countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, and Lebanon, Katrin Atkins, senior researcher at Cluster Munitions Monitor, said. USAID-supported programmes, including one in Lao, have been discontinued, affecting first aid and rehabilitation efforts such as prosthetics.

In the last 15 years since the Convention on Cluster Munitions, only 10 countries have used the weapons, none of which are States Parties to the accord.

Eighteen countries have ceased production, while 17 still produce or reserve the right to produce cluster munitions. None of these are States Parties. They include Brazil, China, Egypt, Greece, India, Iran, Israel, Myanmar, North Korea, Pakistan, Poland, Romania, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Türkiye, and the United States.