GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Geneva is lending legs 4 April to the UN’s international day for landmine action: around the world, for the fourth such day, people are rolling up one pants leg to show solidarity with efforts to ban landmines and rid the world of those already planted.
The Swiss federal government in Bern today published its strategy for landmine action for the 2012-2015 period, noting that Switzerland spends CHF16 million a year supporting the
“Since the 1990s, Switzerland has been actively campaigning for the implementation of international instruments to prohibit these weapons. The current strategy is its third in succession, and it not only outlines Switzerland’s commitment, but also presents the results that have been achieved to date. It is partly thanks to Switzerland’s support that countries such as Albania or Burundi have been cleared of landmines. Switzerland has made a significant contribution to improving the living circumstances of the affected populations in various regions and countries, including Colombia, Niger, Laos, Libya, the Horn of Africa, and South-East Europe.
“Each year around 16 million Swiss francs are spent on supporting the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD), for the implementation of specific projects in affected countries and the secondment of demining experts.”
The Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, also known as the Ottawa Convention, was adopted in Oslo in 1997 and opened for signature in Ottawa the same year. It entered into force on 1 March 1999. To date 159 States are parties to the Convention with 155 of them no longer holding stocks of anti-personnel mines. Over 44.5 million stockpiled mines have been destroyed by the States Parties.
Of the 50 States that at one time manufactured anti-personnel mines, 34 are now bound by the Convention’s ban on production. Most other States have put in place moratoria on production and / or transfers of mines.
Demining has resulted in millions of square metres of once dangerous land being released for normal human activity. On 1 January 2012, Guinea Bissau became the 20th State Party to declare that it had complied with its Convention obligations to clear all areas containing anti-personnel mines.
Mine Action Strategy of the Swiss Confederation 2012 – 2015 (pdf)
South Sudan reception centre, UNHCR refugee camp, November 2011
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Friday 11 November was a day of rising fears internationally that tensions are building along the Sudan-South Sudan border after a series of bombs were dropped just inside South Sudan’s Unity state, hitting a refugee camp. Several Geneva-based humanitarian groups expressed their growing concern Friday.
And then late Friday came some good news from New York, that the newly-formed Republic of South Sudan has made banning anti-personnel mines one of its first multilateral commitments.
It became an independent state 9 July 2011, but fighting and accusations have continued between the two countries.
South Sudan “deposited its notification of succession to the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, or Ottawa Convention today at the United Nations headquarters in New York, becoming the 158th state to agree to be legally bound by this landmark humanitarian instrument,” the AP Mine Ban Convention office in Geneva said in a statement Friday night.
The news was a bright spot in the otherwise gloomy reports of the bombs and world reactions to them. Authorities in South Sudan blamed Sudan for the bombardment of a refugee camp in the oil-rich border state of Unity, according to UPI.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay called for “an independent, thorough and credible investigation to establish the precise circumstances of this aerial bombing.” She said in a statement late Friday that “The camp at Yida, which is close to the border with Sudan, is housing thousands of civilians, including women and children.” She added that “while the number of casualties is not yet clear, I understand that five or six bombs were dropped on the camp, and that at least one fell close to a school.” Pillay says that if “it is established that an international crime or serious human rights violation has been committed, then those responsible should be brought to justice.”
The UNHRC, the High Commissioner for Refugees office in Geneva deplored the bombings, noting at its weekly briefing Friday that there were reports earlier in the week of bombings in New Guffa Village in Upper Nile state, in addition to Thursday’s bombings in Unity state.
“Several bombs dropped by an aircraft in the Yida area impacted a temporary camp that shelters over 20,000 refugees who have recently fled violence in the Nuba Mountains of Sudan’s Southern Kordofan State.
Two of the bombs fell within the Yida camp, including one close to the school. Fortunately there were no casualties in the camp and we are verifying the situation of surrounding communities. UNHCR had been readying new refugee sites away from the border when the incident occurred in Yida yesterday. We had hoped to begin the relocation of refugees but our efforts have so far been hampered by heavy rains which have made the road to the camp impassable.”
The significance of the measure taken by South Sudan was noted by the Convention’s leadership. “ndmine contamination in South Sudan is a grave problem for reconstruction and development, and impedes agricultural activities,” said H.E. Gazmend Turdiu, the Convention’s President. “By joining the Convention, South Sudan is making a commitment to clear mines on its territory, to assist landmine survivors and to never, under any circumstances, use anti-personnel mines.”
The Internal Displacement Centre (IDMC) in Geneva also voiced its concern Friday, noting that each side has been blaming the other for escalating violence. The US Wednesday condemned Sudan for air attacks in recent days, with State Department spokesperson Mark Toner saying, “The provocative aerial bombardments near the border increase the potential of direct confrontation between Sudan and South Sudan.”
The IDMC said Friday in a statement that
“The government of Sudan has accused South Sudan of supporting rebels on the northern side of the border, in the states of South Kordofan, where fighting has been ongoing since June, and in Blue Nile which has seen fighting since September. On 5 November, Sudan submitted a complaint against South Sudan to the UN Security Council, accusing it of providing rebels with “anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles as well as with ammunition, landmines and mortars”. Sudan has imposed restrictions on humanitarian access to South Kordofan and Blue Nile citing security concerns, including the presence of landmines and the movements of rebel groups. Humanitarian organisations estimate that over 200,000 people have either been displaced or severely affected by the conflict in South Kordofan. The UN estimates that 28,500 Sudanese from Blue Nile have fled to Ethiopia and that 19,500 others have taken shelter among communities along the border.”
South Sudan, for its part, says the IDMC, denies supporting the rebels. It “has repeatedly accused Sudan of supporting rebels on its side, in Upper Nile and Unity states. The most recent fighting in Unity state took place on 29 October, after the rebel SSLA (South Sudan Liberation Army) warned the UN and humanitarian organizations to leave the area for their own safety. This put at risk displaced communities who depend on aid for survival, and troops with the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMiss) were deployed to help local authorities deal with the aftermath of the attacks and to monitor the situation. In addition to ongoing internal displacement within Unity state, the UN has reported more than 20,000 people fleeing into the state from South Kordofan in Sudan. Humanitarian aid organizations are concerned that “the number of people arriving to Unity might double before the end of the year if fighting continues in South Kordofan.”
Landmines in South Sudan are the result of over 20 years of civil war and the United Nations Mine Action Coordination Centre in South Sudan reports that, “all 10 states of the newly-formed country have reported mine-related injuries and deaths. Contamination in 306 villages varies in size, from an item that may take an hour or so to destroy, to entire minefields which could take up to a year or more to address.” The AP Mine Ban Convention says that as of September 2011, “a total of 3,210 injuries and 1,263 deaths had been reported in the country. Since 2005, over 25,000 landmines have been destroyed. To date over 2,700 landmine survivors have received support.”
South Sudan, as a party to the Convention, will now have the right to ask other signatory states for help.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Syria has reportedly become the fourth nation to lay down new landmines in 2011, according to ICBL, the Nobel Peace Prize International Coalition to Ban Landmines, which has strongly condemned the development.
Reports have been surfacing, starting the last weekend in October, that Syria has put down antipersonnel land mines along its border with Lebanon, near the city of Hom, one of the sites of recent protests. A Syrian official was quoted, ICBL reports, as saying the mines were to deter arms smugglers, but there is suspicion they are being laid to discourage people from fleeing the fighting and heading over the border.
Syria is not one of the 157 countries that have joined the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty.
The three other countries who have laid down mines this year are Burma/Myanmar, Israel and Libya under the Qaddafi regime.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Concern over Libya’s use of landmines in the conflict that began in February, and praise for Nigeria, which has destroyed its last landmines, have been part of the agenda at meetings in Geneva of the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention’s Standing Committees.
The meetings are taking place from 20 to 24 June and constitute one of the largest annual gatherings of landmines experts and diplomats. Over 400 delegates representing more than 100 States and dozens of international and non-governmental organizations are taking part.
A new publication was launched 22 June as part of the meetings, “Assisting Landmine and Other ERW Survivors in the Context of Disarmament, Disability and Development”. It points out at the start that “the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention set a precedent in incorporating a legal obligation to assist victims and survivors, no matter how tentative, into an international instrument governing conventional weapons”.
Libyan use of AP mines spotted in March
“New use of anti-personnel mines in Libya was first reported in March and condemned by the Nobel Peace Prize-laureate International Campaign to Ban Landmines”, the AP Mine Ban Convention’s secretariat said in a statement.
Villagers of Husan, in the West Bank could benefit from an Israeli-Palestinian initiative to clear the territory of landmines. Philanthropists in Switzerland have decided to join in the cause by throwing a New Tango benefit concert in Tannay, Canton Vaud, an evening of delightful music for a good cause.
Also see GenevaLunch’s story on the call to demine the fields, made in Geneva in late 2010 by an 11-year-old who inspired several Swiss citizens to take action.
Location: Tannay, Vaud
Link out: http://web.me.com/cynthiaschouker/Demining_Sacr…
Date: 28 May 2011
Start time: 20:30
Landmine removal in Tirana, 2009 (photo, Cartagena Summit)
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Landmine groups meeting in Cambodia this week are calling for more countries to sign the 1997 Landmine Ban Treaty. They are marking International Mine Awareness Day 4 April by drawing attention to the case of Cambodia, one of the world’s most heavily affected countries, with 44,000 survivors.
States Parties the convention, as well as the 2008 Cluster Munitions Treaty, “need to improve efficiency in clearance, including by more precisely identifying affected areas. For example, Cambodia is currently conducting a new baseline survey to better understand the extent of its contamination,” says ICBL, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines.
“Both conventions also require victim assistance to support landmine and cluster munition survivors’ efforts to achieve social acceptance, gain meaningful employment and ensure their rights are respected. In addition to enduring physical pain, survivors report that they are faced with a lack of services and job opportunities, limited capacity-building programs and, most importantly, insufficient financial and technical resources for victim assistance.”
ICBL says that Cambodia needs to fully implement its National Plan of Action for Persons with Disabilities, “which has faltered so far”, to ensure that “survivors receive the support they need to lead dignified lives.”
Two EPFL students use electromagnetic currents to explode mines remotely
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Libya has been laying new landmines, says Geneva-based International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL).
The group said in a statement issued Thursday 31 March that it strongly condemns “the reported use of antipersonnel mines by the Libyan Armed Forces in recent fighting with rebels in eastern Libya.”
More than 50 antipersonnel and antivehicle mines were discovered 28 March near power pylons outside the town of Ajdabiya, by electrical technicians says ICBL. A Human Rights Watch investigation reported that the mines had recently been laid. The Libyan Armed Forces controlled the area from 17–27 March.
The only other country to lay new mines in recent years has been Myanmar/Burma.
Israeli mine survivor’s uncomplicated prose begs for clearer political thinking
Daniel Yuval, age 11, addresses Geneva followup meeting to Cartagena Summit on implementing the Mine Ban Treaty
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Daniel Yuval is 11, an Israeli sixth grader who is in Geneva to make one thing perfectly clear to the world: it should get rid of its landmines and not another single child should be hurt by one. He appears to be getting the message across, both at home in Israel and further afield.
Daniel was enjoying the thrill of his first snow 6 February 2010, playing on a hillside in the Golan Heights with his father, older sister and a younger brothers, when he stepped on a landmine. He lost a leg to it, but gained a power for speaking out against landmines, which is literally moving mountains where adults have been able to achieve far less.
A bill was submitted 10 May 2010 to Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, by 73 members, to establish a national mine action authority to manage the clearance of non-operational minefields. The bill followed Daniel’s address to the Knesset, asking them to take action.
Daniel Yuval during a break in Geneva, 29 November 2010
Israel is one of the 20 percent of countries that have not signed the Mine Ban Treaty. The 1997 treaty was implemented in 1999 and 156 States are signatories. Its web pages note: “The Mine Ban Treaty prohibits the use, stockpiling, production and transfer of antipersonnel mines. It is the most comprehensive international instrument for eradicating landmines and deals with everything from mine use, production and trade, to victim assistance, mine clearance and stockpile destruction.”
Israel and landmine groups estimate it has 260,000 mines.
Some 20 medical operations and 10 months later, with a prosthesis in place, Daniel has caught up on his schoolwork and is getting good grades, his father says. And he’s able to run faster than some of the kids in his class, Daniel says enthusiastically.
Daniel was in Geneva 29-30 November, brought by Roots of Peace. He gave a powerful speech (speech text in full) as part of the first followup meeting to the Cartagena Summit that took place in Colombia in November 2009. His audience included Micheline Calmy-Rey, Switzerland’s foreign minister, and Jakob Kellenberger, head of the ICRC (International Red Cross).
Daniel and Jerry White, founder of Survivor Corps, who also lost a leg on the Golan Heights when he was 20, will receive the 2010 Roots of Peace Global Citizens Award. Roots of Peace seeks to make sacred sites mine-free and safe for pilgrims and other visitors.
The pair spoke to GenevaLunch about Daniel’s experience and its impact on the current state of the Mine Ban Treaty. Daniel has been learning English for six months and hopes to perfect it so he can address the United Nations.
Nearly 4,000 people were victims, yet figure was lowest on record
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Landmine Monitor 2010, released 24 November in Geneva, shows that 2009 was a record-breaking year in several ways, for implementing the 1997 Landmine Treaty.
Nepal was removed from the list of countries which produce mines, leaving 12 on the list. Only three are considered active producers: India, Pakistan and Myanmar/Burma.
The number of casualties of “landmine and explosive remnants of war” (EWR) fell to the lowest annual figure since the Monitor began recording numbers in 1999, with 3,956 people casualties, a 28 percent drop. The Monitor notes that while 11 countries improved their assistance to survivors, in 9 countries their situation worsened.
Highest number since 1999: mined areas cleared
Worldwide, an area fives times the size of Paris was cleared.
Gontard case friction easing with Swiss, Colombian cooperation; $27 billion victim compensation programme high on Colombian gov’t agenda
Vice President Angelino Garzon listens to questions during a sit-down meeting with the press in Geneva
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – “Our goal is that in 15 years, lands can be given back to the farmers exiled from their homes and that social programmes will be in place to help them,” Vice-president Angelino Garzon of Colombia told GenevaLunch during a visit to Geneva Thursday 14 October.
The second highest representative of the new Colombian government elected earlier this year, was in Geneva furthering his government’s agenda with the Swiss government, the United Nations and international organizations.
One of the most-talked about topics on his agenda was the “victim compensation programme” that seeks to give land back to the hundreds of thousands of people displaced by violence in Colombia. The UNHCR estimates that over 3 million people have been internally displaced, which is why land restitution is a top priority for the government.
The $27 billion dollar programme has already put 200,000 hectares in the State’s hands. “We are seeking to confiscate an additional 600,000 hectares from armed groups operating illegally in the country,” he added.
Although the long-awaited plan may still be far in the future, Garzon believes that in Colombia the “political will to make this a priority is on everyone’s agenda.”
Implementing a broad land restitution programme with deep pockets may be viewed with distrust in a country where government agricultural subsidies that were geared to fostering peasant land productivity became linked, in some cases, to shady deals for the rich.
Garzon thinks things will be different now. “The government is counting on additional laws to ensure that [once approved] the programme works well,” he says.
“Priority will be given to women who are heads of households, orphans, people with disabilities and the elderly.”
Colombia to “respect the judicial system” over Gontard affair, bilateral talks to start in January Read more…
Prince Mired of Jordan at GICHD offices overlooking Geneva
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Israel’s commando attack on six ships have grabbed world attention this week. Last week it was North Korea’s torpedoes.
Amid the gloomy talk of wars and fighting, one man was quietly but forcefully convincing military and political leaders to take one step in the other direction, away from the tools of war.
Prince Mired Raad Zeid Al Hussein of Jordan was in Geneva last week as the convention president’s special envoy on the universalization of the Mine Ban Convention, en route to Washington, DC, where he spent the last week of May meeting with several top US officials.
His task: convince the US and 38 other states to sign the treaty, to which 156 other nations have agreed to be bound since the convention entered into force in 1999. The Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention is also known as the Ottawa Convention.
Several countries, including the US, are “coming closer”, he believes. “Having the US would be great. Others would come on board. It would create a media stir.
“There’s not a country we see that doesn’t ask about the US.”
Prince Mired of Jordan in Washington to encourage the US to sign the Ottawa Convention to ban landmines
The US could do enormous good by taking a leadership role and signing, he believes. “This is a walk in the park, compared to Start [the lengthy Start talks with Russia, in Geneva, to reduce nuclear warheads], and a golden opportunity for the US to show the world its goodwill,” he told GenevaLunch during an interview at the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD) where the secretariat of the Convention is housed in.
Prince Mired will provide an update on his Washington and other visits when he reports back 21 June in Geneva to the Standing Committee on the General Status and Operation of the Convention.
Myriad reasons for not signing
The reasons for not signing are specific to each country. But a common thread, he says, is that “leadership is not engaged. There is a lack of awareness, really, of being uninformed. One only has to see and deal with victims to understand the importance of this. People see this less, maybe, in the US” than in other countries.
He had just returned from a visit to Laos before coming to Geneva.
“Laos has taken a leadership role in Asia on cluster munitions and there is widespread hope that it would do the same with respect to anti-personnel mines. The country is enjoying the benefit of being recognized for taking a leading role.” Additional benefits would no doubt flow to Laos should it accede to the AP Mine Ban Convention, he believes.
Step by step means progress
China, like the US, is a large country that has not signed, but “China has taken a number of steps – it has participated and made significant strides.” Russia, with fighting hot spots, is more reluctant, but Prince Mired says “the important thing is to take the next step.”
US delegation at the Cartagena Summit - Photo Courtesy APMBC
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Dozens of members of ICBL, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Campaign to Ban Landmines, visited US embassies and missions around the world Monday 1 March to encourage the US government to sign the Mine Ban Treaty. The treaty became international law in March 1999, just 15 months after it was adopted, the shortest time ever for an international treaty.
The US participated as an observer at the Cartagena Summit on a Mine-Free World, in December 2009 in Colombia. It was the first time the US joined an official treaty meeting and, at the time, the US said it would review its position on the treaty.
The US has not used antipersonnel mines since 1991 and it stopped exporting them the following year. Production stopped in 1997. But it is the world’s largest individual contributor to mine action and victim assistance programmes, and, argues ICBL, it should match its financial commitment with a political commitment to end the threat of the use of landmines.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The United States provided the first clue to its unchanged landmine treaty policy Tuesday 1 December in Cartagena, Colombia, saying its ongoing review of the policy will take time. The US baffled the world a week ago by first saying it had decided not to sign the Ottawa Convention, then two days later saying the matter was still under review. No explanation was given at the time. The Ottawa Convention, signed by 156 countries and in force since 1999, is also known as the international Mine Ban treaty. The Cartagena Summit in Colombia this week is the second five-year review of the progress made under the treaty.
The US issued a brief statement at the conference, saying that “the Administration’s decision to attend this Review Conference is the result of an on-going comprehensive review of US landmine policy initiated at the direction of President Obama.
Danger sign for landmines
Updated 17:20 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The goal of the Cartagena Summit on a Mine-free World, meeting in Colombia 29 November to 4 December, is to eradicate the suffering caused by anti-personnel mines once and for all.
Colombia has had the dubious distinction until recently of being the country with the most casualties from anti-personnel mines. It was overtaken by Afghanistan in 2009. Colombia alone counts 8,081 casualties of landmines since 1990, but it also has 6,285 survivors, people who have lost a limb. Landmines caused almost 5,200 casualties worldwide in 2008, one-third of them children. The 2009 Landmine Monitor Report points out that deaths from landmines are steadily decreasing, down from an average of 7,300 a year for the previous 10 years. Landmine ban groups are keen to get rid of the mines but they are also focusing more on helping survivors.
In Colombia, too, the number of casualties has been falling: 777 deaths in 2008, compared to 895 the previous year.
In Colombia, rebel groups such as Farc and the ELN, as well as paramilitary groups, have planted anti-personnel mines on an estimated 60 percent of the territory. Insurgents increasingly finance themselves through the drugs trade, reported Human Rights Watch in a section on Colombia in its World Report 2009, published in January. They have been invading peripheral regions in the south of the country on the border with Ecuador, ejecting the indigenous populations, and protecting their territories from army incursions by the simple means of sowing anti-personnel mines, many home-made and attractive to children.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The United States heads into the Cartagena Summit, which opens Sunday 29 November in Colombia, now saying that it is continuing to review its policy on signing the international Mine Ban treaty. The US is sending a sizeable official observer team to the summit, with groups from the State Department, Pentagon, US Agency for International Development and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The Cartagena Summit is the second review of the 1997 Ottawa Convention that bans the use, stockpiling, production and transfer of antipersonnel mines. More than 1,000 delegates, including several heads of state, will participate in the summit, which will assess progress made in clearing the world of landmines.
Cause of US shift unexplained
The US said in a statement issued Wednesday 25 November that it is still reviewing its position on signing the 10-year-old Mine Ban treaty – the opposite of what it said the previous day, but it was unclear if the statement was a correction of an error, a change in tactics ahead of the Cartagena Summit that opens 29 November in Colombia, or a change of heart following harsh criticism.
US to be observer only at Cartagena summit
Demining demonstration in Tirana (photo: Cartagena Summit)
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The United States will be attending the Cartagena Summit on a Mine-free World in Colombia 30 November as an observer only, following a review and recent decision not to sign the landmine treaty, US State Department spokesperson Ian Kelly said at a daily briefing in Washington Tuesday 24 November. The summit is the Second Review Conference of the Ottawa Convention, informally known as the landmines ban treaty. CNN reports that the decision comes as a surprise to observers who believed the US has been considering joining the 156 other nations who have signed the treaty, citing Human Rights Watch’s reaction. The decision also dashes hopes of the Geneva-based Cartagena Summit secretariat that the US would soon be a party to the treaty.
The official name of the treaty is the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Antipersonnel Mines and on Their Destruction. It’s also often referred to as the AP (anti-personnel) Mine Ban Convention. It entered into force in 1999. China and Russia are the only other major powers not to have signed the convention.
Not in interests of US defense needs
Kelly’s response when asked why the US is not signing the treaty was that “we made our policy review and we determined that we would not be able to meet our national defense needs, nor our security commitments to our friends and allies if we sign this convention.”
What landmines do: an eloquent image
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Good progress has been made in reducing the number of landmines throughout the world, but much more work remains to be done, with 70 countries still having mines or explosive remnants of war, concludes the Landmine Monitor Report 2009: Toward a Mine-Free World, an annual report published Thursday 12 November by the International Campaign to Ban Landmines. This year’s report includes a 10-year summary since the reports began in 1999. The group is the research and monitoring programme of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Campaign to Ban Landmines.
Eighty percent of the world’s countries are party to the treaty but the report notes that “Thirty-nine countries—including China, India, Pakistan, Russia, and the United States—have yet to join the treaty, but most are in de facto compliance with many of the treaty’s key provisions. In recent years, Myanmar and Russia are the only states using antipersonnel mines. Use by non-state armed groups decreased from a high of 19 countries in 2001 to seven countries in 2008.”
Juanes, Cuban Peace Without Borders Concert (image: 4VFnet)
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Colombian superstar, 17-time Grammy award winning musician Juanes, is giving his voice to the Cartagena Summit on a Mine-free World that takes place in Cartagena, Colombia 29 November-4 December. Juanes, who has sold more than 9 million albums worldwide, in 2006 became the first musician ever to perform in the European Parliament’s debating chamber, as part of the European Union’s commitment to eradicate landmines. He organized the Peace Without Borders concert in September 2009 in Cuba, which Entertainment Daily called “the largest open air gig since the 1959 Revolution”, with half a million people attending.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Switzerland will lead efforts to backup a major conference that opens 29 November in Colombia, the Cartagena summit on a mine-free world. The conference marks the 10th anniversary of the Ottawa Treaty entering into force and provides the opportunity for its second review conference to assess progress and how well the convention is being respected.
(IRAQ) Ayat Suliman’s brother brought an unexploded cluster munition into their house in Samarra, Iraq. The munition exploded and caused burns to form over 65% of Ayat’s body. In Iraq, the United States used at least 1,206 clusters, containing more than 200,000 submunitions; this number represents 4 percent of the total number of air-delivered weapons used by the Coalition (text, image: Magnus Fröderberg for Cluster Munitions Coalition)
Update 11:45 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Several countries, including Switzerland, have begun to destroy their stockpiles of landmines ahead of the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions going into effect. The United Kingdom and France are among larger manufacturers of landmines who have made “dramatic progress” in reducing their stocks, reports Landmine Monitor, which 29 May published a country-by-country report on landmines and the convention.
A total of 96 countries have signed since December 2008. The treaty was drawn up in Dublin, Ireland in May 2008.
Three major cluster munition users, Israel, Russia, and the United States, have not signed the convention. The US alone is estimated to have between 730 million and 1 billion cluster submunitions, which it has transferred to “at least 30 countries,” according to Landmine Monitor.
Broken Chair, broken again - Photo © Jared Bloch
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Landmine victims Monday 2 March called for more nations to join the Ottawa Mine Ban Treaty which went into effect 10 years ago. The call for action in Geneva was made during the launch of the “Road to Cartagena,” the second Review Conference of the Convention, chaired by Norway, to be held in Colombia in November 2009.
Speaking next to the UN broken chair in Geneva, Firoz Ali Alizada, who lost his legs to a landmine in his native Afghanistan, says he was “unhappy to survive.” So was Edgar Moreno who at 16 years of age suffered a similar fate in his native Colombia and had to wait two days before reaching the closest medical center.
The US remains outside the group of 100 countries that Wednesday signed an agreement in Oslo to ban cluster bombs and get rid of stockpiles, saying that although the US shares the humanitarian concerns of the other nations, the ban would endanger American soldiers. Xinhua Afghanistan reportedly had a last-minute change of heart, showing a growing distance from the US Bush administration, and it will now sign the treaty, according to the San Jose Mercury in California. (Ed. note: related article, “Switzerland signs cluster bombs ban Wednesday,” GenevaLunch, 2 December 2008)
Raphael Dallaporta
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Raphaël Dallaporta’s landmines are things of great beauty: small, perfectly designed for the job they are meant to perform, fine colours and shapes. Elegantly photographed, simply framed, starkly displayed, they are at first sight remarkable for their esthetic value. View five and wonder at the art, view two more and shivers start to go down your spine as the realization sinks in that they have one purpose: sheer cruelty.
Dallaporta’s images are part of an effort by Switzerland and Geneva to use art and theatre to draw public attention to the deadly damage caused by landmines and cluster bombs.
Bern, Switzerland and Oslo, Norway (GenevaLunch) – Switzerland on Wednesday will join more than 100 other countries in Oslo, Norway to sign the Convention on Cluster Munitions, a convention which the Swiss successfully lobbied to have approved by consensus when national states met 30 May 2008 in Dublin, Ireland. The Geneva-based ICRC has been active in getting the convention to this point.
Jerry White
Updated 16 October 2008
Given the times and the title of Jerry White’s book, I Will Not Be Broken, you could be forgiven for thinking it is about financial markets’ victims; as he writes in the book, “We hate to call bad news normal, but it is.” (GL book review, 16 October 2008)
White, an American who lost his leg to a landmine in Israel at age 20 while out hiking with friends, is promoting the book in Geneva while visiting the office of Survivor Corps. He co-founded the group, which before 2008 was called Landmine Survivors Network. White is also known as a leader of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Campaign to Ban Landmines
White is addressing a group hosted by GWIT, Geneva Women in International Trade, Tuesday noon. The day before the meeting White, who is a frequent public speaker, reflected on why people attend his talks about five steps to overcoming a life crisis. Some, of course, are facing or have recently faced a crisis and are looking for guidance. But in a city like Geneva, he says, where many people work for non-profit groups and NGOs (non-governmental organizations), he is likely to “find people in the audience who come because they’ve said to themselves ‘Let me see how one of my peers talks about this.’”
Their response often catches them by surprise, he says. Some of them may not fully understand their motivation for being involved in their work but during the course of the conversation about life crises “you get closer to identifying with survivors” and their own particular wounds start to surface.
White’s talks help spread the word about the work of Survivor Corps, which is known for its peer support programme that encourages survivors to help others recover from war injuries and trauma. His goal in talking to the public “is to have you identify yourself as a survivor. I don’t think we can really ask people to care about some unknown girl in Phnom Penh.” He is looking for more than just an emotional connection to survivors: he wants people to better understand that we all have crises, we are all survivors. As such, we can provide effective support as part of a survivor movement.
The organization changed its name, despite having a clear reputation with the earlier name, partly because “if you’re trying to mobilize people and build bridges, you have to make sure there are not lines drawn around them” that define but also set apart landmine victims, rape victims or other groups.
Survivor Corps works with war survivors in particular, but White’s book is aimed at a much larger audience. He writes that “Experience has taught me that happy endings can never be taken for granted. They must be chosen.” No matter what the personal crisis, whether it’s a lost limb, an illness that carries a death sentence, the loss of a loved one, a painful divorce, he argues that “we have to tap inner sources and develop some emotional muscle. It’s both a discipline and our responsibility.”
Five key steps to doing this, White says, are:
- face facts
- choose life
- reach out
- get moving
- give back.
Jerry White’s presentation 14 October: details, GWIT
Title: Jerry White on Crisis Management
Location: Geneva
Description: Co-Founder of Survivor Corps, co-recipient of Nobel Peace Prize, author: “I Will Note be Broken”
Start Time: 12:00
Date: 2008-10-14
End Time: 14:00
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Efforts to reduce risks to humans from cluster munitions are making slow progress despite failure to adopt a proposal to address these risks. However, a group of governmental experts meeting at the UN says progress was indeed made by addressing international humanitarian law, building political momentum and laying the foundation for further negotiations.
The next round of talks will take place in July in Geneva. Sixty-eight countries have voiced their support for a partial ban of cluster munitions with the exception of Russia and China, two of the arms producers.
Cluster munitions are intended to destroy fields or make terrain impassable and can remain dormant for years. Unexploded bomblets can detonate later at the slightest disturbance posing special danger to civilian populations.
Related story, GenevaLunch, “Cluster bombs will remain a reality”
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – An annual U.N. weapons conference ended in Geneva November 13 agreeing only to negotiate a "proposal" to address the humanitarian impact of cluster munitions. No specific time frame was given except to say it would be in 2008.
68 countries had voiced their support for a partial ban with the exception of Russia and China, two of the arm producers. The United States said it supported negotiations but not a ban as it considers cluster munitions a legitimate weapon “when used properly and in accordance with existing international humanitarian law." The ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross) considered the news “regrettable” as it lacked legally binding instruments to limit the use of the weapon.
Cluster munitions are intended to destroy fields or make terrain impassable and can remain dormant for years. Unexploded bomblets can detonate later at the slightest disturbance posing special danger to civilian populations.
Related story, UN broken chair is reminder of cluster munitions damage, GenevaLunch, 7 December 2006
