OWN CORRESPONDENT, AFP | Saturday
LAND mines have killed at least 100 people and injured 327 others in Angola during the first six months of the year, a UN report said this week.
A total of 427 accidents involving land mines were documented in the report by the UN Office Charged with Humanitarian Assistance (OCHA). Some 251 accidents occurred while people were travelling.
Thirty-six people stepped on land mines while walking near villages, 32 stepped on mines while farming, and 24 while people were foraging for food, according to Angolan government numbers cited in the UN report.
In 268 cases, the victims identified were men. Women were victims in 125 cases, and the gender of the victim was not known in the remaining cases, the report said.
The number of children involved in land mine accidents dropped during the first six months of the year, compared to the same period last year, the report said.
The report did not say how many accidents involved children, but credited an educational campaign with the decrease.
Some 95 of the victims were soldiers, the report said. The report did not indicate whether they fought for the government or the rebel National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA).
Northern provinces of Angola were generally safer, with no land mine accidents reported in Luanda, Cabinda, Cunene, Namibe and Zaire provinces.
An estimated 100000 people have undergone amputations because of injuries received from land mines since Angola’s civil war broke out in 1975. Humanitarian groups put the civil war’s death toll at 500000.