MP: Ukraine Launches Procedure to Withdraw from Ottawa Convention on Anti-Personnel Mines

President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has signed a decree initiating Ukraine’s withdrawal from the Ottawa Convention.

Member of Parliament Roman Kostenko announced this.

He explained that the current realities of the war mainly drive this decision, as the enemy is not a party to the Convention and is extensively using landmines in its aggression against Ukraine.

At present, the Verkhovna Rada is preparing to review a draft law formalizing Ukraine’s denunciation of the Ottawa Convention.

Ukraine signed the Ottawa Convention on February 24, 1999, recognizing the need to ban the use of anti-personnel mines. At the time of ratification, Ukraine possessed one of the largest stockpiles of such mines in the world — over 6 million units, including types such as PMN, PMN-2, POM-2, and others covered by the Convention’s ban.

The disposal process took more than ten years. By 2020, Ukraine declared the complete destruction of banned types of anti-personnel mines, except for a small quantity permitted to be kept for training and scientific purposes in accordance with the Convention’s text.

It is important to note that the Convention also prohibits certain methods of using mines. For example, the anti-personnel MON-50 mine is not banned under international law and the Ottawa Convention, provided it is detonated manually by an operator.

Meanwhile, using such mines with tripwires or seismic sensors is a direct violation of the Ottawa Convention, as in these cases, the mine is activated by contact with a person.

In 2025, countries such as Finland, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia officially withdrew from the Ottawa Convention. The initial announcements of their intentions were made as early as March. All these countries will formally end their participation in the Convention six months after officially notifying the United Nations.