Great Expectations for Bangkok Meeting

Author/Origin: Sue Wixley

(Tuesday 09 September 2003 )

MEDIA ADVISORY

• WHAT: Fifth Meeting of States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty
• WHEN: 15 – 19 September 2003
• WHERE: United Nations Conference Centre (“ESCAP Building”), Rajadamnern Nok Avenue, Bangkok, Thailand

(1 September 2003) The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) has high expectations for the annual meeting of member states to the international treaty that bans antipersonnel landmines: the Fifth Meeting of States Parties to the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production, and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines, and On Their Destruction.

The conference is to be hosted by the Government of Thailand in downtown Bangkok and formally convened by the United Nations (UN) from 15 to 19 September. Over 600 delegates from around the world are expected to take part in this event, including diplomats, landmine survivors, campaigners and UN workers.

BACKGROUND

• States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty will use the meeting to consolidate their work of promoting and implementing the 1997 treaty. Significantly, it will be the last formal meeting of member states before a major treaty milestone, the Review Conference, which takes place in Nairobi, Kenya in late 2004.
• The ICBL will participate actively in the meeting:“We will be holding States Parties to account, urging renewed commitment to finish the job of building a mine-free world”, said coordinator Elizabeth Bernstein. The campaign, which has lobbied for a global prohibition of antipersonnel landmines since the early 1990's and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997, releases its Landmine Monitor Report 2003, on 9 September.
• The conference promises to bring attention to the mine problem in Thailand and in the region. More than a third of Asia is mine-affected, and it is home to some of the world’s most severely contaminated countries (Afghanistan, Burma and Sri Lanka) and biggest producers and stockpilers of the weapon (China, India Pakistan, South Korea and Singapore).

CONTACTS

For information on press conferences and photo opportunities or to arrange interviews with ICBL ambassadors, campaigners, deminers, landmine survivors and others, please write to media@icbl.org. Or contact: Sue Wixley (ICBL media officer): + 66 (0) 5 164 2679. For Thai media, please call Sushira Chonhenchob (Handicap International Thailand Communications Manager): 02 619 7833 ext 14.

Also call our office at the UN Conference Centre: + 66 (0) 22 88 2416 (only 15 - 19 September).

For media accreditation please contact: Thawadi Pachariyangkun: tel + 66 (0)2 2881861 or pachariyangkun.unescap@un.org and Valère Mantels: VMANTELS@unog.ch.