Unexploded ordnance survey under way

A nationwide survey to determine areas affected by unexploded ordnance [UXO] in Afghanistan following the US-led war against terror is under way, a mine expert told IRIN in the capital, Kabul, on Tuesday. "We will be identifying priority areas by sending out teams to interview people in areas where the coalition have been operating," the director of the Mine Clearance Planning Agency (MCPA), Atiqullah, said. The MCPA is an Afghan NGO and the implementing partner of the UN's mine-action programme for Afghanistan, entitled Post-Conflict Contamination Assessment. The survey will take three months to complete with some 15 teams of people working in the capital, Kabul, the southern province of Kandahar, the northern provinces of Konduz and Mazar-e Sharif, and Paktia in the east. "We have information from the coalition forces on the areas which were affected during the bombardment and will use this as our guide," Atiqullah explained. "These areas could be highly dangerous, so we need to identify them and warn people about them as soon as possible," he added. Funded by the US-based Centre for Disease Control, through the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation (VVAF), the survey will also focus on identifying mines in areas that were previously inaccessible during the ongoing civil war in Afghanistan. "We are also going to include environmental damage caused by unexploded ordnance in this survey," the operations officer for the survey, Joseph Donahue, told IRIN. "We contacted the UN's mine-action office and approached the idea of the survey, and they said it was sorely needed." Asked whether there was an estimate of how much land in Afghanistan had been affected by UXO, Atiqullah replied: "There are millions scattered all over". Afghanistan is one of the most heavily mined countries in the world, with up to 300 people dying from UXO and mines every month.