Bahamas
Cluster Munition Ban Policy
Summary
Non-signatory the Bahamas has never made a public comment on cluster munitions or attended a meeting of the Convention on Cluster Munitions, but has voted in favor of every annual United Nations (UN) resolution promoting the convention. The Bahamas is not known to have used, produced, transferred, or stockpiled cluster munitions.
Policy
The Commonwealth of the Bahamas has not acceded to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.
The Bahamas has never commented publicly on cluster munitions, but its representatives have met campaigners to discuss the convention and the humanitarian rationale for joining it.[1] In October 2016, officials said the government was working to accede to the convention and saw no objections to joining.[2]
The Bahamas did not participate in the Oslo Process that created the convention in 2008.
The Bahamas has never attended a formal meeting of the convention, though a government official participated in a regional workshop on the convention in Grenada in March 2020.
The Bahamas voted in favor of the annual United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution on the Convention on Cluster Munitions in December 2021, which urged states outside the convention to “join as soon as possible.”[3] The Bahamas has voted in favor of the annual UNGA resolution promoting the convention every year since it was first introduced in 2015.
The Bahamas has also voted in favor of UNGA resolutions expressing outrage at the use of cluster munitions in Syria.[4] It has also voted in favor of Human Rights Council resolutions condemning use of cluster munitions in Syria.[5]
The Bahamas is a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is not party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW).
Use, production, transfer, and stockpiling
The Bahamas is not known to have used, produced, transferred, or stockpiled cluster munitions.
[1] For example, in an August 2015 letter, the country’s representative to Canada thanked CMC member Mines Action Canada for inviting the Bahamas to accede to the convention. Letter to Paul Hannon, Executive Director, Mines Action Canada, from Roselyn Horton, High Commission for the Bahamas, Ottawa, 25 August 2015.
[2] ICBL-CMC meeting with the delegation of the Bahamas to the UNGA First Committee on Disarmament and International Security, New York, October 2016.
[3] “Implementation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions,” UNGA Resolution 76/47, 6 December 2021.
[4] “Situation of human rights in the Syrian Arab Republic,” UNGA Resolution 75/193, 16 December 2020.
[5] See, “Situation of human rights in the Syrian Arab Republic,” Human Rights Council Resolution 43/28, 22 June 2020.
Mine Ban Policy
Policy
The Commonwealth of the Bahamas signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 3 December 1997 and ratified it on 31 July 1998, becoming a State Party on 1 March 1999. The Bahamas has not enacted new legislation specifically to implement the Mine Ban Treaty.
The Bahamas has not attended any recent meetings of the treaty. It did not attend the Third Review Conference in Maputo in June 2014. The Bahamas last submitted a Mine Ban Treaty Article 7 report in 2009.
On 5 December 2018, the Bahamas voted in favor of UN General Assembly resolution 73/61 promoting universalization and implementation of the convention, as it has done in previous years.[1]
The Bahamas is not party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons, nor is it party to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.
Production, transfer, stockpiling, and use
The Bahamas has never used, produced, imported, exported, or stockpiled antipersonnel mines, including for training purposes.
[1] “Implementation of the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on Their Destruction,” UNGA Resolution 73/61, 5 December 2018.