Country & Territory Reports - Landmine Action

843 “PAAMI 2001-2004,” April 2001. PAAMI is Guinea-Bissau’s national mine action plan for 2001-2004.
844 Article 7 Report, Form J, 13 May 2003, page 16.
845 CAAMI Document “Action de la Guinee-Bissau concernant la mise en oeuvre de la Convention de Ottawa pour l”elimination des mines antipersonnel”,
January 2004, p. 11; UNDP, “Guinea-Bissau seeks help to be first in Africa to eliminate landmines”, Newsfront, (E-newspaper), 14
January 2004, available at: www.undp.org.
846 Interview with Irene Laval, PEPAM Assistant, CAAMI, Bissau, 30 April 2004.
847 REPÚBLICA da Guiné-Bissau. Decreto n. 4/2001. Boletim Oficial, n. 38, 17 September 2001, pp. 381-383.
848 Interview with CAAMI, Bissau, 30 April, 2004.
Honduras
Background
Over the past two decades, Honduras’ border zones have
been areas of conflict and refuge for combatants, resulting
in ERW and MOTAPM contamination on the borders with El
Salvador and Nicaragua. Although Honduras completed its
official National Demining Plan in June 2004, several areas
remain affected by ERW and MOTAPM.
Assessment of the problem
Since the National Demining Plan was completed, two
areas remain affected by ERW and MOTAPM: El Rio Negro
and Naco, Cortes.
An eight-kilometre stretch of the Rio Negro, on the border
between Nicaragua and Honduras, is affected by ERW,
MOTAPM and AP mines. In 1998 floods from Hurricane
Mitch redirected the river causing landslides that moved
and buried the ERW and mines up to 1.5 metres deep in
the area. 849
AV mines have also been found in Choluteca and El
Paraiso. As of 2 April 2004, three AV mines had been
destroyed in the department of El Paraiso and four in the
department of Choluteca. 850 In January 2004, the demining
team working in El Triunfo discovered four AV mines. Local
farmers had already abandoned the El Triunfo area due to
numerous accidents. 851
An explosion in a munitions storage area on 13 September
1993 in Naco, Cortes, contaminated a wide area with
exploded and unexploded munitions of various types, mostly
grenades and mortars. 852 Some 200 square metres were
cleared in 1993 and 1994, but demining was abandoned due
to lack of funds, with a large area remaining to be cleared. A
study by EOD specialists is being planned to assess the
situation and estimate clearance costs. 853 Despite two
accidents at the site, it has not been cleared because it is not
in the prioritized border region. 854 Other areas near the
Honduran-Nicaraguan border may contain ERW due to heavy
troop movement and shelling experienced during the
Sandinista-Contra conflict. 855
Impact
Honduran officials estimate that from 1990 to 1995 ERW
and mines killed more than 200 civilians. Another five
casualties were reported from March 1996 to September
1997. 856 Examples of ERW casualties include:
honduras 79
■ On 31 December 2002, a six-year-old boy died and his
mother was injured in Siguate, near the El Aguacate
former military base in Olancho Province, when an
abandoned anti-aircraft missile exploded. The missile was
propping up the mother’s cooking fire when it
exploded. 857
■ In January 2004, two children were wounded by an
unidentified item of ERW that was buried in the yard of a
military service person. 858
There has been no survey to assess the impact of AV mine
and ERW contamination on local communities in the Rio
Negro area, but irrigation projects have been halted until
the area has been cleared and declared safe. 859
ERW, MOTAPM, and AP mines prevented displaced persons
from returning to the homes they had left to avoid the
conflict in the border regions. 860 Only recently, following
the clearance of affected areas, are these people returning
to cultivate their land. 861
In September 2003, Honduran police discovered a cache of
AXO, including 343 dynamite cartridges and four fragmentation
grenades, which had been abandoned by arms
dealers. This was the second similar discovery in 2003. 862
Efforts to address these problems
The Honduran Army and the OAS provide risk education to
affected populations through radio programming and
distribution of education materials. In 2002 and 2003, risk
education was delivered in the Department of Choluteca;
in the first quarter of 2004, students and others received
risk education in the community of La Lodosa, Department
of El Paraíso. 863
Because of the lack of maps or data on MOTAPM or ERW
contamination in Honduras, all clearance is done in
response to community reporting. 864 In El Triunfo,
Choluteca, clearance teams were brought to an affected
area after communities reported animal casualties. 865
ERW and MOTAPM clearance in Honduras is the responsibility
of the Honduran Army (ALFA team), which began
clearance in September 1995 with support from the Inter-
American Defense Board (IADB) and the OAS. Clearance
erw and motapm – global survey 2003–2004