Macedonian Fears Over Detonation of Bosnian Cluster Bombs

Skopje recently offered its army training ground of Krivolak in central Macedonia to help Bosnian and Herzegovina get rid off the notorious bombs, which are left over from the 1992-95 war in the country.

Military analyst Petar Skrbina argues that these bombs, although non-radioactive, may harm the environment.

“When cluster bombs explode they create particles harmful to health,” Skrbina told Balkan Insight.

“These pollutants usually end up in the soil,” he said, but “a strong wind could carry them right to the [nearby] towns of Negotino and Kavadarci”.

The region of Tikvesh that stretches around these two towns is best known for its wines. Most of the country's bottled wines come from this area.

The Macedonian Defense Ministry has denied claims that the detonations will cause pollution. It issued a statement saying the planned detonations would not harm the environment and that they would produce smoke that is “equal to burning three cubic meters of wood”.

The Ministry has said that nothing has been definitively decided yet but that special teams from the Army are mulling the details of the detonation.

Macedonia offered to destroy some 75,000 Serbian-made projectiles called “Orkan” and an additional 250 explosive warheads after Serbia, the producer of the weapons, refused to do so on its own soil.

The Norwegian Embassy in Skopje has donated some €100,000 to help the effort.

A cluster bomb is made up of many smaller explosives that disperse through a wide area when fired in order to do more damage than a single bomb. If left unexploded on the ground, some of these charges can explode years after they are dropped.