Why is Japan so negative about banning cluster bombs?

Japan Press Service Co., Ltd. is the only news agency providing information of progressive, democratic movements in Japan

Why is Japan so negative about banning cluster bombs?

The Japanese government refused to support a declaration calling for a treaty banning cluster bombs adopted at an international conference in Oslo.

Japan's Self-Defense Forces also possess cluster bombs, the same type as U.S. forces have, but refuse to give details on the quantity under possession.

The government explains that the SDF possesses such weapons in case Japan is invaded so extensively that the SDF cannot fire back with its conventional bombs.

In the Iraq War, carrier-borne aircraft of the U.S. Kitty Hawk, which is homeported at Yokosuka, heavily bombarded Iraq with cluster bombs.

The Japanese government has kept defending such inhuman acts by saying, "The U.S. forces carefully choose targets to avoid harming civilians."

The Japanese Communist Party has denounced cluster bombs as indiscriminate, inhumane, and cruel weapons. Pointing out that the SDF, that is supposed to exist for defensive defense purposes, has no need at all to possess such weapons, the JCP has demanded the abolition of those weapons.
- Akahata, February 25, 2007