TEXT: ANTI-LANDMINE EFFORT SHOWING PROGRESS IN CENTRAL AMERICA

 
(U.S. partner in OAS program) 
By Eric Green  
USIA Staff Writer  
  

WASHINGTON -- An international program, in which the United States is  
a major contributor, is continuing to show progress in removing  
landmines planted during armed conflicts in Central America, according  
to the State Department.  
  

The program, administered by the Organization of American States, has  
removed hundreds of mines from Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Honduras in  
the last several years. The United States contributed $500,000 to the  
program in fiscal year 1996, and is scheduled to contribute $1.335  
million in fiscal year 1997, the State Department says.  
  

One area where the program is making progress is along the Costa  
Rica-Nicaragua border, where explosive mines were planted during the  
Nicaraguan war between the Contras and the Sandinistas during the  
1980s. In 12 months of work, some 45 mines are reported to have been  
destroyed, the last five just last week in a region around the Costa  
Rican hamlet of Los Chiles. A number of other sites in the country are  
also targeted for demining.  
  

A State Department official said the demining program is scheduled to  
be expanded to Guatemala in the coming year, where there are a number  
of unexploded ordnances remaining from that country's long civil war.  
  

The United States, the official said, helps to train individuals in  
detecting and destroying explosive mines, and supplies helmets,  
bullet-proof vests, and anti-splinter shoes. The official said the  
Central American demining program is administered from Tegucigalpa by  
the OAS's Inter-American Defense Board.  
  

Besides Central America, the United States is contributing to the  
international effort to remove landmines in Africa, Indochina, Bosnia,  
and Afghanistan. U.S. Army General Larry Dodgen said in October that  
the United States spends more on demining than the rest of the world  
combined (around $68 million this fiscal year with a projected  
increase of 25 percent next year) and has military experts training  
deminers around the world.  
  

Though landmines cost less than $3 apiece on average to produce, the  
effort to remove them, including training, equipping, transporting and  
maintaining demining personnel, costs between $300 and $1,000 per mine  
found. The United Nations has estimated that a minimum of $33,000  
million will be needed to clear the landmines already in place  
worldwide.  
  

The White House reported earlier this year that people in 64  
countries, mostly in the developing world, face a daily threat of  
being killed or maimed by an estimated 100 million landmines buried  
around the globe. The anti-personnel landmines, the White House said,  
murder and maim more than 25,000 people every year.  
  

The United States has announced it plans to destroy by the end of 1999  
about three million nonself-destructing anti-personnel landmines, with  
program well underway. The United States will retain only those  
nonself-destructing mines needed for training and for safeguarding its  
security forces on the Korean Peninsula.  
  

More than 80 countries have announced they will sign an international  
convention this week in Ottawa, Canada, banning the use, storage,  
production and transfer of landmines. The United States, however, has  
announced it will not sign the treaty because it could endanger U.S.  
troops. President Clinton said the accord fails to give the United  
States time to phase out mines intended to protect against a North  
Korean invasion of South Korea, where some 37,000 U.S. troops are  
stationed.  


(end text)



(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S.
Department of State.)