Human Rights Watch (HRW) has urged the US Congress to block a proposed $256 million transfer of US-origin cluster munitions and missile systems from Turkey to Ukraine, warning that the decades-old weapons pose serious risks to civilians.

Turkey has requested US authorization to “retransfer” tens of thousands of cluster munition rockets, missiles and artillery projectiles that have been in its stockpiles for decades, HRW said in a statement on Tuesday.

The proposed deal includes Turkey’s entire inventory of 12 M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) launchers as well as three types of cluster munitions containing more than 10 million explosive submunitions.

The package comprises 70 M39 Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) ballistic missiles, each carrying 950 M74 anti-personnel and anti-materiel submunitions; 2,524 M26 rockets, each containing 644 M77 dual-purpose improved conventional munition (DPICM) submunitions; and 47,000 M509A1 203mm artillery projectiles, each carrying 180 M42 DPICM submunitions.

The three types of munitions together contain more than 10.1 million individual submunitions, according to HRW.

The weapons were originally produced in part by Turkey under licenses from the United States dating back to 1987. The artillery projectiles that make up the bulk of the proposed transfer were removed from US service in 1994 when the howitzers that fired them were retired, HRW said.

“Dumping obsolete cluster munitions into a conflict creates a humanitarian liability for civilians that is tragically foreseeable,” Nicole Widdersheim, HRW’s deputy Washington director, said.

“The impact on civilians of these more than 30-year-old inaccurate and unreliable munitions is what motivated 112 countries to ban the weapon by joining the international Convention on Cluster Munitions,” she added.

US prepared to authorize transfer

In a notification submitted to Congress on August 6, a senior State Department official said the US government was “prepared to authorize” the transfer.

According to the notification, Turkey “seeks to reduce its inventory of older defense articles to focus its financial resources on modernization and sustainment of existing systems.”

The State Department also said Ukraine wants to acquire the systems to bolster its offensive and defensive fire-support capabilities as it continues to resist Russia’s invasion.

“Ukraine already possesses munitions of the same or essentially similar type,” the notification said.

Civilian risks of cluster munitions

Cluster munitions disperse large numbers of smaller explosive submunitions over a wide area. Because some of the submunitions fail to explode on impact, they can remain dangerous for years and effectively function as landmines, posing a continuing threat to civilians even after fighting has ended.

HRW said the weapons are inherently indiscriminate because they cannot be targeted with sufficient precision and can leave large numbers of unexploded submunitions behind.

The 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions prohibits the use, production, stockpiling and transfer of the weapons. More than 100 countries are parties to the convention, but Turkey, the United States, Ukraine and Russia are not.

Both Russia and Ukraine have used cluster munitions during the war that began with Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

The United States has also supplied cluster munitions to Ukraine. Although Washington is not a party to the Convention on Cluster Munitions, restrictions on the export of such weapons have been included in annual US defense spending legislation since 2009.

Former president Joe Biden bypassed those restrictions between July 2023 and October 2024 to authorize at least seven transfers of cluster munitions to Ukraine, according to HRW. The quantities supplied were not publicly disclosed.

The Foreign Assistance Act allows a US president to circumvent the restrictions by determining that such security assistance is vital to US security interests and notifying Congress.

HRW said it is not publicly known whether the Trump administration has made a similar determination for the proposed transfer from Turkey.

Congress can review the proposed transfer and could attempt to block it through a joint resolution of disapproval.

“These types of cluster munitions are notorious for their record of not hitting their targets and hurting civilians,” Widdersheim said.

“They should never be used. Congress can still act to stop this short-sighted and dangerous transfer.”