Our planet must be undermined.

A report on current global efforts and what the UN is doing

Anti-personnel landmines kill or maim an estimated 30,000 people each year. Most victims are civilians. People in some 70 countries live with the constant threat of millions of landmines and pieces of "unexploded ordnance" - shells, grenades, rockets and other explosive devices left in the wake of war.

Progress in clearing the estimated 110 million mines and pieces of unexploded ordnance already in the ground depends on slowing and eventually stopping the planting of new landmines. The urgency is reflected not in numbers of landmines to be cleared, but in the needless suffering, damage and economic hardship they cause. Every hour of every day a person somewhere - most often a civilian - is killed by a landmine; 10,000 are killed and twice as many are injured each year. The presence of mines cuts the productivity of agricultural land and can make roads and other critical infrastructure dangerous or unusable.

Dealing with the mines already in the ground is the United Nations most immediate priority. These silent killers can impoverish entire communities. They deny people access to their land and make roads and infrastructure virtually useless. Development itself is held hostage. The presence, or even the fear of the presence, of a single landmine can prevent cultivation of fertile fields, robbing families or entire villages of their livelihood.

On 3 December, in Ottawa, Canada, the new Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of AntiPersonnel Mines and on their Destruction opened for signature.

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A coalition of like-minded States, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and international institutions has achieved a major step towards bringing the crisis under control. The Convention is the product of a "fast-track" negotiating process initiated by Canada in 1996, and supported by a groundswell of public opinion against landmines.

The "fast track" was taken in October 1996 after a conference to review an earlier international agreement, the UN Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects, concluded in May 1996. Usually referred to as the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons or "CCW", this Convention was adopted by the General Assembly in 1980 and is the only international agreement already in force which specifically relates to landmines.

The CCW Review Conference tightened provisions of the 1980 Conventions Protocol II on anti-personnel landmines, but failed to achieve agreement on a comprehensive ban. Despite the limited progress achieved at the CCW Review Conference, like-minded Governments, joined by a broad range of organizations, were determined to negotiate a new convention by the end of 1997.

Canada onvened the Ottawa Conference in October 1996 which began a series of meetings leading to adoption of a new treaty in Oslo, Norway; in September 1997. The Ottawa process had demonstrated that significant agreement exists on the urgent need for action to deal with the landmine problem as a humanitarian crisis.

But a number of States have declined to sigh the new Convention banning anti-personnel mines. They recognize the need to deal with the humanitarian disaster caused by tens of million of indiscriminately-laid anti-personnel landmines, but maintain that the controlled use of anti-personnel mines remains essential for legitimate defense. Future attempts to find common ground on the issue are likely to continue at the United Nations and in other international forum s.

States that do become parties to the new Convention will be obligated never to use, develop, produce, stockpile or transfer anti-personnel mines. The Convention also commits States Parties to destroy or ensure the destruction of stockpiled mines within four years, and to eliminate anti-personnel mines in mined areas within 10 years, unless granted an extension under rules set down in the Convention. The agreement will enter into force when it has been ratified or acceded to by 40 States.

Until the new Convention signed at Ottawa takes effect, the CCW and its Protocol II on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby Traps and Other Devices remains the only source of international treaty law that directly applies to landmines. Since its adoption at a UN conference in 1980, some 70 States have become parties to the CCW; more than 60 have approved its original Protocol II concerning landmines. Ten States have accepted the amended Protocol II, adopted by the CCW Review Conference in May 1996.

Following a 1993 General Assembly initiative, a Review Conference of CCW States Parties met in September 1995 with a view to tightening the landmines-related provisions of the 1980 Convention. In May 1996, after difficulty negotiations in two resumed sessions, the Review Conference adopted an amended Protocol II and Final Declaration. The amendments banned the use and transfer of non-detectable mines; restricted use of mines that do not self-destruct or self-deactivate, as well as the remote delivery of mines; prohibited anti-sensing devices designed to disrupt clearance operations; and extended the Protocol's scope to cover internal, as well as international armed conflicts. However, the amended Protocol II still fails to prohibit mines that do not self-destruct within a given period, and remotely-delivered mines. It also still lacks substantive verification or compliance mechanisms, and States Parties are allowed a nine-year grace period to comply with detectability, self-destruction and self-deactivation mechanisms on landmines.

Where transfers of mines are concerned, the Amended Protocol II binds States Parties:

* not to transfer any mine, the use of which is prohibited by the Protocol;

* not to transfer any mine to any recipient other than a State or a State agency authorized to receive such transfers;

* to exercise restraint in the transfer of any mine, the use of which was restricted by the Protocol, in particular anti-personnel mines, to States which are not bound by the Protocol; and

* to ensure that any transfer place in full compliance with the Protocol and applicable norms of international humanitarian law.

Despite the importance of the amendments to Protocol II of the CCW, they represent only limited progress.

In 1995, the General Assembly called on Member States to declare a moratorium on the export of anti-personnel mines. Almost all landmines are foreign-made. More than 50 countries are thought to produce between 500,000 and 1 million mines per year. Of these countries, 35 are known exporters. Several hundren types of mines are currently produced by approximately companies. Recent studies by Africa Watch and the United States Congressional Research Service recorded no fewer than 37 different mine types in Angola, from at least 8 countries. A similar variety has been found in Somalia and Cambodia. to the ICRC, more than 30 countries have voluntarily declared moratoriums on the export of anti-personnel mines.

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With millions of mines and unexploded ordnance scattered in dozens of countries, the work of demining will continue well into the next century. The new Convention recognizes the key role the United Nations would continue to play in addressing the crisis.

The United Nations Secretary-General is expected to serve as the conduit for reports from States about the quantities and types of mines they have stockpiled, the steps they are taking to clear the mines they have laid, and their plans to destroy stocks and to convert or decommission landmine production facilities. States Parties can ask the Secretary-General to help resolve questions concerning compliance by other Parties to the agreement. When requested by a meeting to States Parties, the Secretary-General may also assemble and dispatch fact-finding missions of experts and report their findings back to the Parties.

The central role of the UN in assessing the extent of landmine threats, mobilizing resources for recovery and building local capacity to deal with landmines is confirmed by the Convention. UN mine action programmes include mine surveys and mine awareness campaigns to reduce casualties, training of local deminers and administrators, and establishment of demining schools. The UN system also helps improve medical and rehabilitation services for landmine-blast survivors in countries whose health care systems are the least equipped to handle them.

Since its first systematic UN mine clearance operation in Afghanistan, begun in 1989, the UN system has helped countries devise mine action plans and establish national training programmes, and provided administrative support. Working with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and NGOs, UN programmes have helped restore livelihoods and economic opportunities, and have rehabilitated thousands of traumatized landmine survivors. In 1997, major UN mine clearance programmes were under way in seven countries: Afghanistan, Angola, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cambodia, Croatia, Lao People's Democratic Republic and Mozambique.

Mine Action Centers (MACs), established by the UN in cooperation with national governments, oversee all mine clearance and related activities in the field and record results on national databases. International staff are employed as technical advisers and to train national managers, instructors, supervisors and deminers. Several national mine clearance schools have been established where trainees receive instruction to international standards in mine-surveying and clearing, as well as in paramedic skills. The objective is to transfer management of operations from a UN-supported programme with internationally-recruited specialists to national organizations; and from expatriate to national staff. Progressively, international staff are phased out and national personnel assume full responsibility.

In recent years, the United Nations has worked on specific facets of the landmine problem in post-conflict zones:

* UN peacekeepers have been involved in demining on three levels: operational demining essential to safe deployment and movement of peacekeepers; building local demining capacity by equipping and training local deminers; and "peacebuilding" or "reconstruction" mine clearance aimed at restoring infrastructure.

* The UN Development Programme supports mine action programmes to ensure that they are integrated with other post-conflict reconstruction and development work, and that they can be sustained.

* The UN Childrens Fund activities are designed to limit the effects of mines on women and children through mine awareness programmes, physical and psychological rehabilitation of victims.

* The UN High Commissioner for Refugees focuses on mine awareness programmes and raising funds for landmine demarcation and clearance where landmines directly threaten refugees and returnees.

* The World Food Programme's activities include clearing mines from roads and agricultural land, as well as providing food and logistical support for national demining activities.

The goal of UN mine action programmes is to help mine-affected countries establish their own, self-sustaining national capacity to deal with all aspects of the landmine problems, an economic necessity. In some places, the cost of fielding a single international expatriate deminer can finance as many as 50 local mine clearance staff. UN and UN-supported mine action programmes employ some 6,000 full-time deminers, of whom about 200 are expatriates.

Funding

In 1994, the UN Voluntary Trust Fund for Assistance in Mine Clearance was established. The Trust Fund helps launch mine clearance operations and provides seed money for coordination mechanisms in the field. It finances assessment missions, provides funds to "bridge" financing delays for specific programmes, and helps buy urgently-needed equipment. By October 1997, more than 40 countries and organizations had contributed a total of $32.5 million and pledged an additional $10 million to the Voluntary Trust Fund. The ten largest contributors to date are the European Union, Japan, Denmark, the United States, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Italy, Sweden and the United Kingdom.