Human rights watch documents new deadly cluster munition attacks in Syria

The Syrian government forces are using a powerful type of cluster munition rocket "not seen before in the conflict," causing civilian casualties and adding to the country's already devastating legacy of unexploded ordnance, said the Human Rights Watch (HRW)."Evidence indicates that government forces used the rockets containing explosive sub-munitions in attacks on Keferzita, a town north of Hama in northern Syria, on February 12 and 13.The rocket is the largest type of cluster munition rocket to be used in Syria and contains sub-munitions that are more powerful and deadly than other types of sub-munitions," HRW said in a statement."It is appalling that Syrian government forces are still using banned cluster munitions on their people," said Steve Goose, arms division director at Human Rights Watch, in a statement late on Tuesday."Cluster bombs are killing Syrian civilians now and threatening Syrians for generations to come," he added.Photographs of rocket remnants provided to the rights group by local activists who said they took them after the attack show sections of a 9M55K 300mm surface-to-surface rocket - including parts of the rocket motor, its cargo section, nose cone, and the associated connectors. Also pictured was an unexploded cylindrical 9N235 antipersonnel fragmentation sub-munition, the type delivered by the 9M55K rocket, with markings indicating the sub-munition was manufactured in 1991.The 9M55K rocket is launched from the BM-30 Smerch (tornado in Russian), a multiple launch rocket system designed and initially manufactured by the Soviet Union in the late 1980s and then manufactured and exported by the Russian Federal State Unitary Enterprise "SPLAV State Research And Production Association" from 1991 onward.In a related matter, Argentinean Ambassador Maria Cristina Perceval told reporters following a closed-door meeting to discuss a Western-Arab draft resolution and Russian amendments about immediate humanitarian access to all over Syria that she suggested to include in the draft a call on all parties to stop providing weapons to the Syrian warring parties, but her proposal was rejected. Syria gets most of its weapons from Russia, its closest ally.