Canada donates $400,000 to help remove landmines

Mar 23rd, 2009 by Jon Posted in Nicaragua News | No Comments

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On March 19, the Canadian government donated $400,000 USD to help Nicaragua demine its land after decades of war. As part of its commitment to the Ottawa Convention - the international treaty to ban landmines - Canada has donated $6 million to help Nicaragua remove antipersonnel mines since 1998.

While this recent announcement will help improve the lives of Nicaraguans living or working near these areas, the amount donated marks a 46% decrease from $750,000 CAD (approx. $750,000 USD in March 2008) given by Canada to Nicaragua a year ago.

With this decrease, it isn’t a surprise to learn that Nicaragua’s progress in removing these deadly weapons is slow. Due to a decrease in international funding, 100 qualified deminers were laid off in 2007 leaving just 70 personnel for the entire country according to this report on ICBL. To compound this problem, the terrain in which work is being done is increasingly difficult.

The report states:

Nicaragua estimates there are 17,000 landmines in the remaining areas, a figure they consider as important, if not more important, than the remaining area to clear. Originally, Nicaragua estimated there were 135,000 landmines to find and destroy but through February 2008 have found 155,000 and now expect to find a total of 175,000 (i.e. 20,000 more).

With more mines being discovered each year, the work that needs to be done keeps increasing. More funding is needed so that deminers can be employed to remove these newly discovered mines.

The social impact of landmines
With the risk of landmines, it is difficult to build an effective infrastructure to support an economy. Road construction, farming, and urban development can not proceed in affected municipalities until the risk of death from buried explosives is removed.

Locals living in these areas, in particular children, are constantly at risk of serious harm or death.

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While visiting Tasbapauni in 2008, the locals warned us not to travel into the woods because of landmines. Tasbapauni was the location of at least 2 major confrontations between the Sandinistas and Contras in the 1980s.

Additional information: