More than 90 countries or disputed territories are contaminated by unexploded weapons, and more than 50 by anti-vehicle mines, according to the first global survey of their impact on civilians, aid workers and peacekeepers, published on Monday.
The report is published by Landmine Action, an independent campaigning group, to coincide with a meeting of the UN’s Conventional Weapons Convention in Geneva to discuss ways to control the use of anti-vehicle mines and cluster bombs.
”Explosive remnants of war are costing civilian lives and livelihoods in 90 countries, many of them the world’s poorest” says Richard Lloyd, director of Landmine Action. He adds: ”Anti-tank mines are stopping the delivery of water, food, healthcare and other humanitarian services in impoverished countries such as Sudan, Afghanistan and Angola. This leaves the most vulnerable populations even weaker.”
He called on Britain to take the lead in pushing for an effective legal framework to protect civilians from unexploded weapons and help the victims.
The report says that in Iraq, more than 2 200 sites contaminated by unexploded cluster ”bomblets” have been identified along the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Many accidents in the south and centre of the country are the result of people handling unexploded bombs, mortars and grenades to sell on, partly as scrap metal. There are believed to be 800 refuse sites around Baghdad contaminated by cluster bombs and dumped munitions.
In Kosovo, the report continues, 75 areas of cluster munition contamination remain, nearly six years after Nato’s bombing campaign. Continuing civil unrest in Kosovo has resulted in criminal gangs using anti-tank mines as booby traps.
Following legal action against the British government over accidents at firing ranges in Kenya, 1 280 villagers received compensation payments totalling £5m.
Forty-five routes in the Nuba Mountains area in Sudan, have been identified as ”high-risk, suspect or reportedly mined”. Humanitarian agencies have had to travel further and pay more to deliver aid because of anti-tank mines. Agricultural land has been abandoned after tractors hit mines.
In Angola, anti-vehicle mines block access in all 18 provinces, preventing distribution of humanitarian aid and denying freedom of movement to thousands of internally displaced people and other civilians.
In September 2003, a vehicle taking displaced people to their homeland hit a landmine in Malange, killing 10 and injuring 30. In Ethiopia, United Nations agencies suspended work after a truck detonated a mine in April, 2004. In Afghanistan the same year,eight civilians were killed when their pick-up truck hit an anti-vehicle mine. – Guardian Unlimited Â