This Protocol to the Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects was approved at a conference of signatory states in Geneva on May 3, 1996.
President Putin wrote in the letter that Protocol II as amended on May 3, 1996 stipulates tougher requirements on the use of anti-personnel mines, prohibits to use anti-personnel mines which are not detectable, and to use mines, booby-traps or other devices which employ a mechanism or device specifically designed to detonate the munitions by the presence of commonly available mine detectors. The Protocol also stipulates that each High Contracting Party shall undertake not to transfer any mine the use of which is prohibited by this Protocol, and not to transfer any mine to any recipient other than a State or a State agency authorised to receive such transfers.
In accordance with the Protocol, the signatory states may postpone the liquidation or the prohibition of use of the mines prohibited in this protocol “for a period not to exceed nine years from the entry into force of this Protocol”.
The President wrote that the signing of Protocol II by Russia, the United States and China, the largest producers and users of mines, will have decisive influence on the effectiveness and universal application of this Protocol and will encourage other states to sign it.
“We want Protocol II, which came into force in late 1998, to have a maximally large number of signatories,” Mr Putin wrote in his letter.
The President issued instructions appointing Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and Defence Minister Igor Sergeyev the official representatives of the President at the ratification debates in Parliament.