Bloomberg via Getty Images Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) signage is displayed at the Royal Bank Plaza in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, on Thursday, Dec. 18, 2014. Royal Bank of Canada Chief Executive Officer David McKay said U.S. moves to normalize relations with Cuba present an opportunity for the lender to return to the Caribbean nation. Photographer: Kevin Van Paassen/Bloomberg via Getty Images

OTTAWA — Four Canadian financial institutions invested $565 million in the companies that manufacture cluster bombs, a weapon that is banned under a UN treaty that Canada has ratified, says a report released Thursday. The report was released in Ottawa by the Dutch peace group PAX, part of the international coalition against the indiscriminate weapons that have been widely linked to the deaths of civilians.

Manulife Financial is among the companies linked to investment in banned cluster munitions. (Photo: Sean Marshall/Flickr) The companies are among 158 worldwide that invested $28 billion in companies connected to the weapons between June 2012 and April 2016, the report said. Paul Hannon, executive director of Mines Action Canada, is calling on the Trudeau government to issue guidelines that would ban such investments by Canadian institutions. Canada has ratified the Convention on Cluster Munitions, and while it doesn't explicitly ban the investments, Hannon said they can be viewed as "a form of assistance" in the use of the weapon. "These are inhuman and indiscriminate weapons and no financial institution should be investing in them," said Hannon. "Whether it's because they don't realize that they're doing this, whether it's because they're such huge corporations, and one arm doesn't realize what the other arm is doing, that's fine. But they now need to understand."