The use of a laser weapon specifically designed to cause permanent blindness to an unenhanced human eye, prohibited under Protocol IV to the 1980 United Nations Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, adopted in 1995, which requires a state party not to employ such a weapon and to take precautions against the incidental blinding effect of a laser system used for another lawful military purpose, such as rangefinding or target designation. The protocol was adopted in significant part due to advocacy by the International Committee of the Red Cross and human rights organizations documenting the severe, permanent, and disproportionately cruel injury a purpose-built blinding laser weapon would inflict compared with its limited additional military value over an otherwise-equivalent conventional weapon, making it one of a small number of weapon types subject to a preemptive ban adopted before the weapon saw widespread battlefield use.
Facts
Elements of OffenseEmploying laser weapons specifically designed, as their sole combat function or as one of their combat functions, to cause permanent blindness to unenhanced vision. 1 Classification
Offense GradeSerious or Indictable Offense 1 Connections
Has Offense Grade
Entity-backed identity for the offense-grade enum value this offense already carries, resolved to a crime concept by an explicit value-to-entity map (phase 3 bucket conversion, docs\design_entity_backed_browse_buckets_20260928.md). The offense-grade fact itself stays on the offense unchanged.
Sources
1. Protocol on Blinding Laser Weapons (Wikipedia)
Article 1 prohibitionQuote, Article 1 prohibition
It is prohibited to employ laser weapons specifically designed, as their sole combat function or as one of their combat functions, to cause permanent blindness to unenhanced vision
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