Harvest fields littered with unexploded cluster bomblets

This is one of the sickest twists of the conflict yet. It's harvest season in Georgia, the time when traditionally there are big harvest festivals featuring all of the local school dance troops, wrestling matches, singing groups, and of course fresh wine competitions and produce evaluations. Sound familiar? This year, here is what Georgian farmer (not even in South Ossetia) has to deal with:

"Zviad Geladze, 38, showed Human Rights Watch researchers fields contaminated with submunitions. He estimated the submunitions covered an area extending at least one kilometer through his farm. The fields are full of produce ready to harvest. Because humanitarian agencies continue to lack access to much of the Gori region, fields like Geladze’s may provide residents of the region with their only food source." Full article from Human Rights Watch here.

Just in case you thought there were only one or two of the highly dangerous "cluster bomblets," which Russia continues to deny using, here is photo proof and witness accounts:









© 2008 Human Rights Watch


During the attack on August 8 in Shindisi, Vano Gogidze, 45, was killed and his relative, Dato Gogidze, 39, was injured. Also in Shindisi, Ramaz Arabashvili, 40, was killed and four people were wounded when a submunition that they had gathered from a field exploded on August 10. On August 18, in Pkhvenisi, Veliko Bedianashvili, 70, died when a submunition exploded in his hand. “There are so many of these lying around. The fields are full of them,” said his son, Durmiskhan Bedianashvili.