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In Laos, there
is a worrying new trend that has led to an increase in the number of
casualties from unexploded landmines.
Most accidents used to be caused by the clearing of land for agriculture.
But increasingly, victims are those who collect the mines to be sold to
factories.
The impact of the Vietnam war in neighbouring Laos, is still very much visible today.
It is estimated that over 2 million tonnes of bombs
were dropped in Laos during the war between 1965 and 1973 and as many as 30
percent of them are believed to be still buried underground or left lying
around, unexploded.
In fact, some experts believe, two-thirds of Laos had been severely
contaminated.
Although villagers know of the dangers of the mines, poverty has forced many
to risk their lives by collecting the unexploded ordnance, and sell them to
steel factories.
So 2004 has seen a drastic increase in the number of casualties from
unexploded ordnance.
The National Humanitarian Mine Action Programme, or
UXO Lao, which was established in 1996, has since destroyed over 500,000
unexploded mines.
But the effort is just not enough.
Kingphet Phimmavong,
Coordinator, Provincial Office, UXO LAO, said:
"We can clear about 250 hectares of land each year but the villagers
need more than twice that area. We can't match that requirement because of
budget constraints and manpower shortage. We're doing our best. We took 10
years to clear about 1,500 hectares of land but there's still 1.5 million
hectares, so it may take forever."
At the rate they're going, the workers say it will be another 800 years
before all the land in Xiengkhouang Province
alone is cleared.
300,000 tonnes of explosives were dropped there and
that translates to 2 tonnes for every villager, who're mostly farmers.
Bounleuth, Chief of Ban Xuao,
PhaXai District, said:
"We grow corn and vegetable here and down the hill. We need land to
cultivate rice and we use the slopes to grow other crops. We also raise
cattle. We have to till the land by using hoe and mattock which is difficult
and dangerous so we have to be very careful."
Since the war ended, unexploded ordnance has killed over 11,000 people
throughout Laos.
But the numbers could be much higher because many incidents occur in remote
areas and are not reported. - CNA
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