Battle area clearance (BAC) – The systematic and controlled clearance of dangerous areas where the explosive hazards are known not to include landmines. 

Clearance – Tasks or actions to ensure the removal and/or the destruction of all mine/ERW hazards from a specified area to a specified depth.

Cluster bomb – Air-dropped cluster munition.

Cluster munition – According to the Convention on Cluster Munitions, a cluster munition is “A conventional munition that is designed to disperse or release explosive submunitions each weighing less than 20 kilograms, and includes those explosive submunitions.” Cluster munitions consist of containers and submunitions. Launched from the ground or air, the containers open and disperse submunitions (or bomblets, from fixed dispensers) over a wide area. Submunitions are typically designed to pierce armor, kill personnel, or both.

Confirmed hazardous area (CHA) – An area where the presence of landmines, mine, unexploded submunition or bomblet, and other ERW (mines/ERW) contamination has been confirmed on the basis of direct evidence of the presence of mines/ERW.

Convention on Cluster Munitions – An international convention adopted in May 2008 and opened for signature in December 2008, which entered into force on 1 August 2010. The UN Secretary-General is the depository. The convention prohibits the use, production, stockpiling, and transfer of cluster munitions. It also requires stockpile destruction, clearance, and victim assistance.

Diversity – A term that refers to the different aspects that make up a person’s social identity, for example: age, (dis)ability, faith, and ethnicity, among others. 

Dual-purpose improved conventional munition (DPICM) – A type of cluster munition that can be used against both personnel and material targets, including armor. 

Explosive ordnance risk education (EORE) – Activities which seek to reduce the risk of death and injury from explosive ordnance by raising the awareness of women, girls, boys, and men in accordance with their different vulnerabilities, roles, and needs and by promoting behavioral change. This includes public information dissemination, education and training, and community liaison. 

Explosive remnants of war (ERW) – Under Protocol V of the Convention on Conventional Weapons, explosive remnants of war are defined as unexploded ordnance and abandoned explosive ordnance. Mines are explicitly excluded from the definition.

Interoperability – In relation to Article 21 of the Convention on Cluster Munitions, interoperability refers to joint military operations with states not party to the convention that might engage in activities prohibited to a State Party.

Intersectionality – A concept that captures the consequences of two or more combined systems of discrimination, and addresses the manner in which they contribute to create layers of inequality.

Gender – A term that refers to the range of characteristics, norms, behaviors, and roles associated with women, men, girls, and boys, as well as relationships with each other, and that are socially constructed. As a social construct, gender varies according to socio-economic, political, and cultural contexts, and can change over time. 

Humanitarian mine action (HMA) – All activities aimed at significantly reducing or completely eliminating the threat and impact of landmines and ERW upon civilians and their livelihoods. This includes: the survey and assessment, mapping and marking, and clearance of contaminated areas; capacity-building and coordination; risk education; victim assistance; stockpile destruction; and ban advocacy.

Non-state armed groups (NSAGs) – For the Monitor’s purposes, non-state armed groups include organizations carrying out armed rebellion or insurrection, as well as a broader range of non-state entities, such as criminal gangs and state-supported proxy forces.

Non-technical survey (NTS) – The collection and analysis of data, without the use of technical interventions, about the presence, type, distribution, and surrounding environment of mine/ERW contamination, in order to define better where mine/ERW contamination is present, and where it is not, and to support land release prioritization and decision-making processes through the provision of evidence. Non-technical survey activities typically include, but are not limited to, desk studies seeking information from central institutions and other relevant sources, as well as field studies of the suspected area.

Oslo Process – The diplomatic process undertaken from 2006–2008 that led to the negotiation, adoption, and signing of the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions.

Persons with disabilities – Those who have long-term physical, mental, intellectual, or sensory impairments, which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others.

Self-destruct mechanism – Under the Convention on Cluster Munitions, an “incorporated automatically-functioning mechanism which is in addition to the primary initiating mechanism of the munition and which secures the destruction of the munition into which it is incorporated.” 

Self-deactivating – Under the Convention on Cluster Munitions, automatically rendering a munition inoperable by making an essential component (e.g. a battery) non-functional.

Submunition – Any munition that, to perform its task, separates from a parent munition (cluster munition). All air-dropped submunitions are commonly referred to as “bomblets,” although the term bomblet has a specific meaning in the Convention on Cluster Munitions. When ground-launched, they are sometimes called “grenades.”

Survivors – People who have been directly injured by the explosion of a landmine, submunition, or other ERW and have survived the incident.

Suspected hazardous area (SHA) – An area where there is reasonable suspicion of mine/ERW contamination on the basis of indirect evidence of the presence of mines/ERW.

Technical survey (TS) – The collection and analysis of data, using appropriate technical interventions, about the presence, type, distribution, and surrounding environment of mine/ERW contamination, in order to define better where mine/ERW contamination is present, and where it is not, and to support land release prioritization and decision-making processes through the provision of evidence. Technical survey activities may include visual search, instrument-aided surface search, and shallow- or full sub-surface search.

Unexploded submunitions or unexploded bomblets – Submunitions or bomblets that have failed to explode as intended at the time of use, becoming unexploded ordnance.

Unexploded ordnance (UXO) – Munitions that were prepared to explode but for some reason failed to detonate. 

Victim – According to the Convention on Cluster Munitions, “allpersons who have been killed orsuffered physical or psychological injury, economic loss, social marginalization or substantial impairment of the realization of their rights caused by the use of cluster munitions. They include those persons directly impacted by cluster munitions as well as their affectedfamilies and communities.”