Cluster bomb wounds two Belgian soldiers in Lebanon

"The two soldiers were carrying out demining operations in Kunin (southeast of the port city of Tyre) when a cluster bomb exploded," Liam McDowall said Monday.

He said one was wounded in the leg and the other in the head, and they were taken to a UN makeshift hospital in the area. Their lives were not in danger.

On December 29, another two Belgian deminers were also wounded in similar circumstances.

Belgium has 370 troops with the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), which comprises around 12,000 blue-helmeted soldiers, mostly from European countries.

During the 34-day conflict in July and August last year, Israel is believed to have dropped more than a million cluster bombs in Lebanon. The UN says 40 percent of the apple-sized bomblets failed to explode on impact.

Israel has been roundly criticised for using cluster munitions during the war with Hezbollah that ended with a UN-brokered ceasefire on August 14.

The US State Department said on Monday that Washington believed that Israel probably violated US arms export agreements by using US-supplied cluster weapons in civilian areas of south Lebanon during the war.

The US Arms Export Control Act bans the use of cluster munitions against populated areas. Israel says Lebanese civilians were not targeted but that they were warned in advance by leaflets dropped from the air.

Unexploded ordnance has killed at least 27 people and wounded more than 140 in Lebanon since the conflict ended, according to an AFP tally.

Cluster munitions spread bomblets over a wide area from a single container. The bomblets often do not explode on impact, but can do so later at the slightest touch, making them similar to anti-personnel landmines.

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