10 years before priority land is demined

The UN’s Mine Action Programme told IRIN on Tuesday that it would take between seven to 10 years to clear high priority areas in Afghanistan from mines and unexploded ordnance left over from the war with the then Soviet Union and subsequent fighting between Afghan factions. The rate of clearance of arable land, residential homes, irrigation canals, roads and grazing land in Afghanistan considered “high priority” and vital to local communities, depended on a sustained commitment by the international community over the next 10 years. Dan Kelly, Programme Manager of the UN mine action programme explained that the annual progress of mine clearance in Afghanistan was entirely tailored to what donors were prepared to finance. “The mine action programme experienced substantial growth as a result of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines in 1996-1999, which focused the world’s attention on landmines. However, this appears to be unsustainable over the long term and we’ve had to reduce our operations accordingly,” he said. Partial funding of this year’s UN appeal left mine action teams in Afghanistan working at 50 percent capacity between September and December last year. A recent donation of US $2.5 million, a tenth of the mine action appeal for 2000, was provided by Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria and the “adopt-a-minefield” project underway in the US. Although the funding has enabled some teams to resume their mine clearance and mine awareness activities, Kelly acknowledged that the planned level of activity had been reduced to better match donor funding. “I wouldn’t call this a funding crisis. It’s more of a reduction in the funding level based on what we think we will receive. This programme has been going for 11 years, so clearly there is going to be some donor fatigue. We just need to come to grips with this and ensure that we have as cost-effective a programme as possible to make it work,” he said. The adopt-a-minefield project, which began with charitable societies in the US was one of the latest efforts to raise funds in an attempt to clear mines from priority areas in Afghanistan. Kelly said that the initiative would soon be taken up by charitable societies in the United Kingdom and hoped that this would help accelerate the rate of mine clearance in Afghanistan. According to the latest UN surveys, 718 sq km of Afghanistan are still contaminated by landmines, of which 338 sq km are considered as vitally important land and earmarked for priority clearance. In addition to causing about 3,000 civilian casualties per year, the total economic loss to Afghanistan over the last 10 years has been estimated to be more than US$ 550 million.