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Sunday, Nov. 15, 2020

Does America’s use of depleted uranium weapons violate national or international law?

Jacob Alabab-Moser, Gigafact Foundry
no

The U.S. Defense Department since the 1970s has used depleted uranium, the material left after the uranium enrichment process, to make bullets and mortar shells. The substance is mildly radioactive, and highly hazardous when ingested and inhaled.

It is not currently banned or restricted under any existing disarmament agreement, according to the UN Disarmament Forum. DU-containing projectiles are legal on a case-by-case basis. The Law of Armed Combat does not absolutely prohibit the use of any weapon. Rather, it bans the use of weapons designed to cause superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering to enemy combatants, which may apply in the case of DUs. U.S. domestic law could be seen as bound to this principle, as the U.S. is party to the Geneva Convention and bound to international custom.

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