The United Nations Mine Action Coordination Centre (UNMACC) spokeswoman has said that only 122,500 of an estimated one million Israeli cluster bombs had been destroyed. For the the Lebanese population, they thought the worst of last year's war between Israel and Hezbollah was over when the ceasefire halted 34 days of fierce Israeli bombardment of south Lebanon. They was wrong. So far, around 200 people have been maimed by cluster bombs dropped by Israel in the final three days of the war before a UN ceasefire took effect.

“Cluster bombs are everywhere: on main roads, schools, hospitals, internal roads, inside houses, swimming pools, backyards, trees," said Dalya Farran, spokeswoman for the UNMACC in Lebanon.

Official figures state that only 30 people have been killed by the bombs since the war, however, unofficially aid workers feel that this a lot more, as random bodies are discovered in fields on a regular basis.

Dalya said UNMACC had checked and cleared 20 million square metres (215 million square feet), or about 54%, of an estimated contaminated area of 37 million square metres. Dalya said UNMACC's job would be much easier if Israel provided 'strike data', detailed information on where cluster munitions were fired during the war, which might save lives. "The biggest obstacle is that we don't have strike data. It's timeconsuming to locate more sites. What we need is geographical location, types (of munitions) and quantities.”

Israel says it uses cluster bombs in accordance with international law, which does not ban them. "The United Nations has repeatedly requested the strike data from Israeli forces, but we never got an answer," concluded Dalya.