Objective

To accelerate global humanitarian demining operations, as well as landmine survivor assistance, to eliminate the threat of landmines to civilians by the year 2010.

The Problem

Tens of millions of landmines in over 60 countries threaten innocent civilians, inflicting an estimated 26,000 casualties every year. Having dedicated more than $150 million to humanitarian demining programs over the past five years, the United States expects to spend over $80 million in Fiscal Year 1998 alone in demining programs in some 19 countries. However, if the global effort at humanitarian demining were to continue at present levels, it could take decades to remove the threat of landmines to economic and social development in the poorest areas of the world, extending landmine casualties well into the next century. To respond to this critical humanitarian cause and bring it to a much earlier conclusion, the United States is proposing a coordinated global campaign to eradicate the threat of landmines to civilians by the year 2010. We believe that a concerted international effort, building on the momentum of new global attention to the scourge of landmines, can make this a reality.

The President's Initiative

The President's 2010 Initiative on Global Humanitarian Demining aims to create an effective international coordination mechanism to ensure that sustained public and private resources for demining are directed, in an organized and rational manner, to programs in the mine-affected countries. To promote this effort, the United States will host a conference in Washington in May 1998, bringing together the key donor governments, international organizations, and regional organizations representing mine-affected countries to define the elements of an international coordinating mechanism for global humanitarian demining, landmine survivor assistance, and research and development of demining technology. The State Department publication, "Hidden Killers," is being updated and expanded to help provide a better baseline of information for the international demining community.

The President and Secretary of State have appointed Ambassador Karl F. Inderfurth as their Special Representative for Global Humanitarian Demining to lead this effort. The Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense are working in partnership to realize the following goals:

-- ensure that global humanitarian demining is an international priority supported by adequate resources and action;

-- increase the pace and effectiveness of demining operations;

-- bring global investment, both public and private, in humanitarian demining to the level of $1,000 million per year and to direct additional resources into landmine survivor assistance;

-- develop mechanisms for matching needs and resources more effectively, with special focus on creative public-private partnerships;

-- coordinate R&D (research and development) initiatives and share new demining technologies and data bases;

-- create sustained assistance to landmine survivors and communities.