Secretary at the Ministry of Peace and Reconstruction Dhruba Sharma said Sunday that the Nepal Army, with support from the UN Mine Action Team (UNMAT), completed clearing all landmines from 53 different places last week. [break]
"The works on de-mining has completed. But we are waiting for a report on quality assurance from the army to officially declare the completion of de-mining," Secretary Sharma told Republica.
Nepal Army spokesperson Ramindra Chhetri said the army is set to formally announce the completion of de-mining works on June 14. He informed that altogether 10,941 landmines from 53 locations and 1,078 improvised explosive devices (IED) have been cleared.
Clearing the landmines and the IEDs laid during the insurgency is one of the obligations of the government and the UCPN (Maoist) under the historic CPA.
The 5.1.4 provision of the CPA required the government and the Maoists to inform each other about demarcation and storage of ambush or mines laid during the insurgency within 30 days and help each other to defuse or dispose of within 60 days since the date of its signing.
However, the UCPN (Maoist) claims it laid no landmine during the conflict period, though the party had used improvised explosive devices (IEDs) during the armed conflict.
The government had formed the Nepal Mine Action Steering Committee with policy responsibilities and a Technical Committee as implementing body to oversee de-mining of the landmines among other things on June 21, 2007. The national army began clearing the mines from October 2007.
Anti-landmine campaigners welcomed the removal of the mines but said more needs to be done.
"It is a matter of happiness to know that the army has cleared all landmines that it had laid," said Purna Shova Chitrakar, an anti-landmine activist, "The Maoists should also remove all the IEDs as soon as possible."
Though the Maoists defused seven tons of IEDs after they joined the peace process, there still are explosives that remain unattended and yet to be identified, according to Chitrakar.
"It is a historic event and a step forward in implementing the Comprehensive Peace Agreement. Internationally, it is not every day that a country declare itself minefield free," said Robert Piper, UN resident and humanitarian coordinator, on the completion of the de-mining task.
Specially trained 180 Nepal Army personnel were involved in clearing the mines. International donors such as the UK, Australia and Switzerland provided de-mining equipment to the national army.
International community through the UN invested over $ 6 million for mine clearance in Nepal. This figure excludes the cost of the labor contributed by the Nepal Army.
Related story
Department Mines and Geology grants exploration permits for 80...
_20191222200001.jpg)
