The European Union has been resolutely engaged in favour of mine victims and persons with disabilities through its policies and assistance, in particular in the implementation of the Council Decision (CFSP) 2021/257 which provides for national stakeholder dialogues to encourage parties responsible for the wellbeing of mine‐affected communities and survivors to better address the challenges they face through strengthened dialogue and partnerships.
Those dialogues will seek to support States Parties in strengthening their multi-sectoral efforts in ensuring that the victim assistance implementation is in line with relevant provisions of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD).
Read more…
Source: Delegation of the European Union to the UN and other international organisations in Geneva
Related:
- Algeria calls on France to compensate 7,300 victims of colonial-era mines
April 6, 2021
France must compensate the victims of landmines planted by its forces during the colonial era, head of the Algerian National Human Rights Council (CNHD), Bouzid Lazhari, has said, adding that French authorities laid more than nine million mines along Algeria’s eastern and western borders, which caused permanent disabilities for 7,300 Algerians. Lazhari’s statement came on Sunday ...
- Biden Keeps Trump’s Policy Retaining Land Mines in U.S. Arsenal, for Now
April 6, 2021
The Defense Department announced Tuesday that it would retain the Trump administration’s policy and keep antipersonnel land mines in its arsenal, reserving the right to use them in war. In a statement, Mike Howard, a Pentagon spokesman, called such weapons “a vital tool in conventional warfare” that the military “cannot responsibly forgo, particularly when faced with ...
- UN: Landmines Still Pose a Threat to Two Million Ukrainians
April 5, 2021
Around 2 million people – roughly the population of Slovenia – are exposed to the threat of landmines and explosive remnants of war (ERW) in eastern Ukraine on both sides of the “contact line”. Ukraine ranks fifth in the world for civilian casualties as a result of landmines and ERW, and in top three for ...
- UNICEF voices concern over death, injury of children by landmine in Libya’s Tripoli
March 20, 2021
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) on Friday expressed concern over the death and injury of children by a landmine in south of the Libyan capital Tripoli. “UNICEF is deeply concerned over the death and injury of children due to an explosive remnant of war (ERW) at the Ain Zara area yesterday evening, 18 March,” UNICEF ...
- Croatia: landmine from 1990s Balkan wars kills asylum seeker
March 7, 2021
A landmine from the 1990s Balkan wars has exploded, killing a migrant and injured several others in an area of central Croatia littered with unexploded ordnance. The blast occurred on Thursday in woodland near Saborsko, close to the Bosnian border where a group of asylum seekers were attempting to traverse the country, Croatian authorities said in ...
- Myanmar: Mro woman lost eyesight, one leg in landmine blast in Rakhine State
January 12, 2021
An ethnic Mro woman, who is recovering at Sittwe general hospital after hit by a landmine explosion, lost her eyesight and one of her legs to severe injuries. Khin San May went to collect firewood from a hill near to Khapaw village on 4 January when she stepped over a landmine at around 12 noon. She was ...
- Guard unit that lost EOD troop in Afghanistan faced ‘funding constraints’ and ‘time-consuming request process’
June 20, 2020
An investigation into the 2018 death of an Army EOD tech in Helmand province, Afghanistan, found that his unit faced equipping and funding issues prior to deployment, but the company command team went to great lengths to resolve those problems before arriving downrange. The investigation also noted that U.S. troops out of Camp Dwyer in Garmsir district had patrolled in the ...
- Butterfly landmines mapped by drones and machine learning
May 27, 2020
IEDs and so-called butterfly landmines could be detected over wide areas using drones and advanced machine learning, according to research from Binghamton University, State University at New York. The team had previously developed a method that allowed for the accurate detection of butterfly landmines using low-cost commercial drones equipped with infrared cameras. Their new research focuses on ...
- The World’s Landmine Challenge Demands Presidential Action
April 2, 2020
This Saturday, the United Nations-proclaimed International Day for Mine Awareness, the world will reaffirm its commitment to eliminate the odious threat that mines and unexploded ordnance pose to civilians in 59 countries around the world. The day will find the United States at a crossroads in its commitment to this goal. Presidential candidates have spent little ...
- Meet the female squad who clear out Vietnam’s unexploded bombs
March 6, 2020
Known as the “landmine girls” the group detonates left behind bombs from the war with the United States that ended in 1975 Two petite women in protective gear walk slowly down an empty field in Vietnam, carrying a large metal detector that clicks and whirrs, searching for unexploded ordnance. Medic and safety officer Nguyen Thi Ha Lan ...
- Trump lifts restrictions on US landmine use
January 31, 2020
US President Donald Trump has lifted restrictions on the deployment of anti-personnel landmines by American forces. The decision reverses a 2014 Obama administration ban on the use of such weapons, which applied everywhere in the world except for in the defence of South Korea. The Trump administration said Mr Obama’s policy could put US troops “at a ...
- Strong global mine ban norm marred by improvised mines trend and high civilian casualties
November 21, 2019
Only one state not party to the Mine Ban Treaty—Myanmar—and a small number of non-state armed groups used landmines in 2018 according to Landmine Monitor 2019. The findings point to the resounding success of the treaty since it entered into force 20 years ago and to the global stigma against use of the weapon. Today there ...
- First Afghanistan province declared mine-free – thanks to an all-female team who cleared them
October 14, 2019
Last year, landmines still killed or injured an average of four Afghans every day. During the past four decades of war, the Mine Action Programme of Afghanistan has cleared more than 18 million explosive remnants of war, about 737,000 anti-personnel mines and over 30,000 anti-vehicle mines since 1989. But by the end of October, the country’s first province ...
- Germany supports demining projects in Sri Lanka
October 11, 2019
On 17 September, German Ambassador Jörn Rohde visited the demining sites of the HALO Trust and Delvon Assistance for Social Harmony (DASH), who is the local implementing partner of Mines Advisory Group (MAG) in Kilinochchi. The aforementioned two non-governmental organisations HALO and MAG received a total sum of 4 million euros (approx. Rs. 800 m) ...
- IEDs: tackling terrorists’ weapon of war
October 9, 2019
Some of the most memorable images of the late Diana, Princess of Wales, show her wearing a protective suit while touring a minefield in Angola in 1997 to raise awareness of the devastating effects of land mines. After meeting 13-year-old Sandra Thijika, who lost her leg after stepping on a land mine, the princess told the ...
- Prince Harry walks through Angola minefield 22 years after Diana
September 28, 2019
Prince Harry visited the site in Huambo, which has become a “bustling community” since Diana’s campaign. Wearing body armour, he also visited a partially-cleared minefield nearby and set off a controlled explosion. Diana captured global attention when she walked through the live minefield in 1997. She never lived to see the full impact of her visit – such ...
- IEDs and the Mine Ban Convention: a minefield of definitions?
September 17, 2019
The year 2019 marks the 20th anniversary of the entry into force of the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention. It will also see the five-yearly Review Conference of the Convention take place in Oslo in November. This momentum has brought about a renewed focus of States Parties and other stakeholders on further strengthening implementation to ensure continued ...
- Thailand: Demining push off with a bang
August 7, 2019
The Ministry of Defence is destroying a total of 3,133 landmines in a bid to get Thailand off the Ottawa Convention’s blacklist. On Tuesday, the Defence Ministry began the push with an event dubbed “Thailand’s Anti-Personnel Mines Stockpile Destruction 2019”, at Observation Hill 152, in Watthana Nakhon district, in the eastern border province of Sa Kaeo. ...
- Statement on New Use of Anti-Personnel Mines, Mine Ban Treaty intersessional meeting
May 23, 2019
Let me start by giving some context on the new use of antipersonnel mines worldwide. In recent years, since the last Review Conference, the use of antipersonnel mines by government forces has been rare. In most years, only one or two governments used mines—Myanmar and Syria – and neither of them used large numbers of ...
- Two students hacked consumer drones to detect landmines
February 11, 2019
Landmines or anti-personnel explosives have been prohibited since 1977, however, so many of them have been used around the world that they continue to kill or injure around 10 people per day. The mines are hidden from sight and some of them, like the Russian-made Butterfly mine, are near impossible to detect with traditional mine-sweeping ...
- Sri Lanka to be declared as a mine-free country by 2020
December 7, 2018
Sri Lanka acceded to the Mine Ban Convention, very well known as the Ottawa Convention, in 2017 which came into force from 1 June. The objective of the Mine Ban Convention is to end the suffering and casualties caused by the Anti-Personal Mines (APM) and Explosive Remnants of War (ERW) by banning the production, use, ...
- Conference calls for increased condemnation of AP mines of an improvised nature and recognition of contamination by these weapons
November 30, 2018
The Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention’s Seventeenth Meeting of the States Parties (17MSP) concluded in Geneva recording success in stockpile destruction and mine clearance in the Middle East and West Africa. While progress was welcome, the Conference agreed that new contamination by anti-personnel mines of an improvised nature should be reported and treated under the Convention in ...