Mine Action Review today published Clearing the Mines 2025, its annual global assessment of anti-personnel (AP) mine contamination, survey, and clearance, ahead of the TwentySecond Meeting of States Parties to the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention (APMBC), taking place in Geneva on 1–5 December.
The report warns that the APMBC is facing the most serious challenges in its more than 25-year history, with treaty violations, withdrawals, and a mounting funding crisis threatening decades of progress. The report highlights grave breaches of the Convention arising from Ukraine’s use of anti-personnel mines and its July 2025 attempt to unlawfully suspend its obligations under the APMBC.
Read more…
Source: Reliefweb News
Sign up for the Counter-IED Report Newsletters
The latest news and insights delivered right to your inbox
Related:
- Cambodia backs Lebanon in landmine clearing
May 29, 2026
Senior Minister Ly Thuch renewed Cambodia’s commitment to global mine action, offering to share the country’s demining experience with Lebanon following Beirut’s entry into the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention. Ly Thuch, who is first vice-president of the Cambodian Mine Action and Victim Assistance Authority (CMAA), said Lebanon’s decision strengthens the global norm against landmines. The move ...
- Croatia declared free of landmines after 31 years
February 27, 2026
Interior Minister Davor Božinović announced Friday that Croatia is officially free of landmines. Thirty-one years after the end of the Homeland War, all known minefields have been cleared — a major milestone for the country. The decades-long effort came at a heavy cost. Over three decades of painstaking and dangerous work, 208 people lost their lives, ...
- Cambodia Reaffirms Ottawa Convention Commitments Amid Reports of Anti-Personnel Mines Along Border
February 26, 2026
The Cambodian Mine Action and Victim Assistance Authority (CMAA) has called for careful, objective, and responsible handling of reports concerning the discovery of anti-personnel mines along the Cambodia-Thailand border. In a statement issued on Thursday, the CMAA reaffirmed Cambodia’s full commitment to its obligations under the Ottawa Convention, stressing that the country has not laid any ...
- Poland prepares to lay mines to defend eastern borders from Russian threat
February 23, 2026
Poland on Friday formally withdrew from the Ottawa Treaty, an international convention that bans anti-personnel landmines, paving the way for their deployment along its eastern borders. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said the country aimed to be able to mine its borders within 48 hours in the event of a threat. Poland plans to deploy the devices ...
- Finland’s withdrawal from Ottawa Convention to take effect
January 10, 2026
Finland’s withdrawal from the Ottawa Anti-Personnel Landmines Convention will take effect on 10 January. Finland remains committed to the humanitarian objectives of the Ottawa Convention. Finland’s decision to withdraw from the Ottawa Convention was based on an assessment of Finland’s defence needs in the deteriorated security environment. Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine has profoundly changed ...
- Landmine casualties hit four-year high as treaty setbacks deepen
December 1, 2025
Civilian deaths and injuries from landmines and explosive remnants of war have risen to their highest level in four years, according to the Landmine Monitor 2025 report launched in Geneva on Monday. It documents 6,279 casualties in 2024. Children remain especially vulnerable, particularly in conflict-affected countries where displaced families are returning to heavily contaminated areas. “Civilians ...
- Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention to hold its Twenty-Second Meeting of States Parties from 1 to 5 December 2025
December 1, 2025
The Twenty-Second Meeting of States Parties to the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention is being held from 1 to 5 December 2025 at the Palais des Nations, Geneva. The Meeting opened at 10 a.m. on Monday, 1 December, under the Presidency of Ambassador Tomiko Ichikawa of Japan. The opening session featured a video-message from the United Nations ...
- Do anti-personnel mines still have military utility in modern warfare?
November 26, 2025
Five States Parties to the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention have recently submitted instruments of withdrawal, citing national security and military necessity, while at least one other has taken steps to “suspend” the Convention. These developments raise important questions about whether anti-personnel mines retain any meaningful military utility in contemporary conflict. In this post, Erik Tollefsen, Head ...
- Clearing the Mines 2025 – Report Reveals Worst-Ever Violations of the Mine Ban Convention and Urges Action by States Parties
November 17, 2025
Mine Action Review today published Clearing the Mines 2025, its annual global assessment of anti-personnel (AP) mine contamination, survey, and clearance, ahead of the TwentySecond Meeting of States Parties to the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention (APMBC), taking place in Geneva on 1–5 December. The report warns that the APMBC is facing the most serious challenges in ...
- Switzerland submits objection to Ukraine’s suspension of the Ottawa Convention
October 17, 2025
Switzerland will object to Ukraine’s decision to suspend the Ottawa Convention, which prohibits the use, production, stockpiling and transfer of anti-personnel mines. At its meeting on 15 October, the Federal Council considered that such a suspension would be incompatible with international law. As a state party to the convention, Switzerland was informed of Ukraine’s decision on ...
- European countries are now turning to landmines to create new deadly defensive barriers from Russia
October 3, 2025
Five Nato countries neighbouring Russia or its ally, Belarus, have announced that they are to opt out of the Ottawa treaty of 1997. This treaty bans the use by signatories of anti-personnel (AP) landmines. These states – Poland, Finland, Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia – now have plans to create a 2,000-mile stretch of mined areas as ...
- Ethiopia Requests UN to Extend Landmine Clearance Deadline for Third Time
August 16, 2025
Ethiopia has requested the UN to again extend a deadline to clear landmines left strewn by wars old and new, placing people at risk on more than 125 million hectares of land. Ethiopia acceded to the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention (APMBC) in 2004 and was initially obligated to clear all known contamination before June 2015—a ...
- Russia says it has evidence Ukraine has repeatedly used anti-personnel landmines
July 9, 2025
Russia’s foreign ministry said on Wednesday that it has evidence that Ukraine has repeatedly used anti-personnel mines which have injured civilians and so Kyiv’s exit from the Ottawa Convention would have no impact on the battlefield. Ukraine last month announced its withdrawal from the Ottawa Convention which banning the production and use of anti-personnel mines. It ...
- Finland and Lithuania set to produce anti-personnel mines
July 9, 2025
Lithuania and Finland look set to start domestic production of anti-personnel landmines next year to supply themselves and Ukraine because of what they see as the military threat from Russia, officials from the two NATO member states told Reuters. The two countries, which border Russia, have announced their intention to pull out of the Ottawa Convention ...
- Ukraine preparing to produce anti-personnel landmines after leaving Ottawa Convention
July 2, 2025
Ukraine has decided to withdraw from the Ottawa Convention banning anti-personnel landmines. Ukrainian manufacturers are already preparing to launch domestic production, Media Center Ukraine reports, citing Fedir Venislavskyi, Representative of the President of Ukraine to the Verkhovna Rada, Member of the Committee on National Security, Defense, and Intelligence, and People’s Deputy. According to him, once the ...