Five-Year Review: State Party Hungary ratified the convention on 3 July 2012 after amending its penal code to establish sanctions applicable to the ban on cluster munitions. It has participated in nearly all of the convention’s meetings and has elaborated its views on a number of important matters relating to the interpretation and implementation of the convention.

According to its initial transparency report for the convention provided in 2013, Hungary has never produced cluster munitions. It has never used cluster munitions. Hungary completed the destruction of a stockpile of 287 cluster munitions and 3,954 submunitions on 8 July 2011.

Policy

The Republic of Hungarysigned the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008, ratified on 3 July 2012, and the convention entered into force for the country on 1 January 2013.

Hungary amended its penal code in 2012 to classify cluster munitions as an internationally prohibited weapon and establish penal sanctions for their “procurement, use, manufacturing and transfer.”[1] Hungary has also reported its 2012 ratification law under national implementation measures.[2]

Hungary submitted its initial Article 7 transparency report for the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 8 April 2013, but, as of 4 June 2015, had not provided any of the updated reports due annually by 30 April.[3]

Hungary actively participated throughout the Oslo Process that resulted in the convention.[4] In November 2007, Hungary enacted a national moratorium on the use of cluster munitions by its armed forces, which remained in place until it became a State Party.[5]

Hungary has continued to engage in the work of the Convention on Cluster Munitions. It participated in the convention’s Meeting of States Parties in 2011, 2012, and 2013, but did not attend the Fifth Meeting of States Parties in San José, Costa Rica in September 2014. Hungary has participated in all of the convention’s intersessional meetings held in Geneva since 2011, most recently in June 2015. Hungary attended in a mine action symposium in Biograd, Croatia on 27–29 April 2015, which included discussion on cluster munitions.

Hungary has voted in favor of recent UN General Assembly (UNGA) resolutions condemning the use of cluster munitions in Syria, including Resolution 69/189 on 18 December 2014, which expressed “outrage” at the continued use.[6]

Interpretive issues

In 2011, Hungary elaborated its views on a number of important matters relating to the interpretation and implementation of the convention, stating its belief that the convention prohibits foreign states from transiting cluster munitions across, and stockpiling on, the territory of a State Party. Hungary believes the convention prohibits States Parties from assisting states not party with prohibited acts, and that it prohibits investment in the production of cluster munitions.[7]

Hungary is a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is also party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons.

Use, production, and transfer

Hungary has stated that it has never used cluster munitions “in the course of an armed conflict” and has never produced cluster munitions.[8]

Stockpile destruction

In April 2013, Hungary declared the completion of the destruction of its stockpile of 287 cluster bombs and 3,954 submunitions of three types: 247 BKF blocks containing 2,964 AO-2.5 submunitions, 23 BKF blocks containing 276 PTAB-2.5KO submunitions, and 17 RBK-250 cluster bombs containing 714 PTAB-2.5M submunitions.[9] The Hungarian Defence Forces destroyed the cluster munitions at Erdőkertes outside of Budapest between 24 March and 8 July 2011.[10] The total cost of the destruction was 38,120,000 HUF or €127,000.

Hungary is not retaining any cluster munitions for training or research purposes.[11]