Nonlethal weapons aren't designed to kill. But some of them can blind, suffocate, cause injury, and violate international law, according to some human-rights advocates. Moreover, some researchers may be taking advantage of the broad scope of nonlethal technology--which spans chemical, biological, and directed-energy weapons--to work on projects that may end up being neither legal nor nonlethal. Led by military expert and human-rights consultant William Arkin, a movement for stricter standards for the development and implementation of nonlethals is in gear.

"We don't oppose nonlethal weapons as a class," explains Steve Goose, program director of the Arms Project for Human Rights Watch. "Instead, we oppose particular weapons that are indiscriminate, excessively injurious or cruel, or potentially inconsistent with existing international laws of war."

One weapon that Human Rights Watch decided to act against on these grounds is the blinding laser, a weapon that formerly had fallen under the nonlethal umbrella. Intended to blind or confuse an enemy's optical and target-acquisition devices, the high-intensity lasers can blind victims permanently. Human Rights Watch teamed with the International Red Cross to demand that the U.S. government ban the devices in combat situations. Secretary of Defense William Perry agreed to the ban last October.

Sensitive to human rights concerns, the National Institute of Justice now runs the nonlethal technologies it develops past a gauntlet of community, civil-rights, and lobbying groups. "It doesn't do you any good to introduce a new technology, no matter how safe, if it looks so bad that it creates a riot that kills people," says David Boyd, the NIJ's director of science and technology.