3MSP Daily Update 1

(Tuesday 18 September 2001 Managua - Nicaragua) Opening day of Third Meeting of States Parties, 18 September 2001

1. ICBL press conference

Jody Williams, Stephen Goose and Diana Roa-Castro spoke at the ICBL’s press conference held at 08h00 on 18 September, before the opening of the Third Meeting of States Parties (3MSP).

“It is difficult to start without remembering the victims of the tragic events one week ago today, but also inappropriate not to remember there are thousands who live with terror every day – like my colleague Diana from Colombia, who will speak later, who lives with terror every day, like my colleagues in Chechnya, Afghanistan, all over Africa, who live every day with terror”, said Williams. She went on to say that “One of the aims of the ICBL was to deal with one type of terror, less visible, that goes on every day: antipersonnel landmines.” In closing, she noted that “however horrifying the acts of last week are it doesn’t make less important all acts of terror, of antipersonnel mines and others, throughout the world every day…We’re here one week after the events to underscore and show that international law is important and terrorism against civilians in any form is unacceptable, and that international law must be observed and followed not just here and on this issue but throughout the world.” (For full text click here)

Speaking next, Goose spoke of the 3MSP as “the most important gathering related to antipersonnel landmines that takes place during the year”. He noted that it is appropriate for the meeting to be held in Nicaragua, as a mine affected States Parties and because of the Nicaraguan government’s key role in implementing the Mine Ban Treaty.

“One of our main expectation is that this week will result in an aggressive and detailed program of action for eliminating antipersonnel landmines,” said Goose. “We expect that a series of recommendations that have been developed over the year will be endorsed and turned into an action plan. We expect that a firm, hard-hitting declaration will be adopted by States Parties here and will commit them to doing all they can to eliminate antipersonnel mines.”

Goose also spoke about the ICBL’s unprecedented Landmine Monitor initiative. The Landmine Monitor Report 2001 shows that “in general, we are winning the war against antipersonnel mines. The trend is in the right direction, as it has been for several years: we find more and more countries are joining the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty, there is an overall reduction in the use of the weapon, we have seen extensive destruction of stockpiles, production has stopped almost all together, more landmines are demined every year and most important of all, we see that the number of new mine victims is decreasing.”

“But it is important to stress that it is by no means all good news. Mines continued to be used by far too many governments and rebel groups and still claim far too many victims every day. There are concerns that States Parties and signatories to the Mine Ban Treaty are not fulfilling their obligations to the Mine Ban Treaty and we’ll advantage of this week to raise those concerns with States Parties,” added Goose.

Roa-Castro congratulated five countries in the Americas for their recent ratifications and noted that the ICBL has reached its goal of 120 ratifications or accessions by the Third Meeting of States Parties. She went on to introduce the Landmine Monitor Report 2001 regional report in Spanish, which includes the executive summary and country reports of all countries in the Americas. Drawing from the findings in the report, she provided an update of the situation in the region and finished off by introducing landmine survivors from the region who are at the 3MSP as part of the Raising the Voices project.

The press conference was attended by about 15 media sources including Nicaraguan radio, television and print media and international wire services (AFP, Xinhua, EFE) and CNN Espagnol.

2. Opening ceremony

There opening ceremony started with the Nicaraguan anthem, followed by messages from Cesar Gaviria, Secretary-General of the Organisation of American States, Jonas Patin, a landmine survivor from Nicaragua, Jesús Martinez, a landmine survivor from El Salvador, Enrique Larenas, the father of a Chilean mine survivor and Juan Carlos Verela, a Nicaraguan soldier and mine survivor. According to Martinez, who spoke on behalf of the Raising the Voices project, “we are here to remind honourable delegations of the human face of mines. We are here to ensure that the humanitarian spirit that inspired the treaty is kept alive”. Martinez also read out a statement from Her Majesty Queen Noor, who was unable to attend the conference.

A film about landmine survivors in Nicaragua, produced for this occasion, was shown and a series of commemorative stamps was unveiled. Gema Maria Peña, the winner of a children’s art competition on which the stamps are based, spoke briefly saying that she was “happy to be contributing her painting” towards the process of ridding the world of mines.

Finally, Nicaraguan president Dr Arnoldo Alemán Lacayo addressed the gathering. “We must continue to promote world peace as we are doing at this 3MSP. We must continue with our common objective which is the humanitarian struggle for the eradication of antipersonnel landmine...Here, the tragic war of the 80s sowed hate and death and now we are struggling to create a peaceful, healthy and prosperous Nicaragua. And as we heard in the moving stories this morning, we are still confronting the effects of mines”.

3. Official opening of the meeting

Ambassador Steffan Kongstad, outgoing President of the conference, opened the meeting and expressed gratitude to Nicaragua for going ahead with this meeting in these circumstances. Ambassador Kongstad emphasised that “we are not engaged in an academic exercise here…our focus remains on the results in the field.” He spoke about the importance of having a shared interpretation of the key obligations of the convention and said he was “disturbed” by allegations of use by a state party and invited clarifications on this issue, urging all states parties to deal with these allegations “in a cooperative manner typical of this process”. He paid tribute to the ICBL and ICRC for starting this campaign and “conveying human suffering into a strong political message” and making governments realize the enormity of this crisis. He noted that they “have become indispensable partners for governments” and that we must further strengthen this partnership. He reminded everyone that we celebrate the fourth anniversary of the adoption of the treaty text in Oslo this week.

He then noted that his term as President has come to an end, and presided over the election of the new President of the Third Meeting of States Parties. Nicaraguan Foreign Minister Francisco Aguirre Sacasa was elected President of the Meeting. The meeting thanked Ambassador Kongstad for his service and then Minister Sacasa took up his post.

The Under-Secretary General for Disarmament Affairs, J. Dhanapala, delivered a statement from the UN Secretary-General. This was followed by an address by Jody Williams, ICBL Ambassador who said: “Our hope, and the hope of every state that took the trouble to come here in this difficult time, is that we take a hard look at issues of compliance with this treaty that still face us. Civil society and governments came together not just to create the treaty but also to ensure full compliance with it. We have always said it is important that it not just be words on paper. It is important that we’re here to underscore the absolute importance of the rule of law. And by being here we also underscore the importance of international law…By reinforcing our own treaty we reinforce the rule of law everywhere.” (see full text of speech).

The Agenda was then adopted, as were the Rules of Procedure and the budget. The President named the following Vice-Presidents of the Meeting: Belgium, Japan, Malaysia, Netherlands, Norway, Peru, Slovakia and Zimbabwe, and all were elected. Vice Minister Arguello was confirmed as Secretary General of the meeting and Kerry Brinkert of Canada was named as a joint Secretary General of the Meeting to provide any aide that might be needed. Friends of the President were elected as follows: Jean Lindt for the Final Report, Steffan Kongstad for the Managua Declaration, Alex Klement and Gustavo Laurie for the President’s Action Plan and Tom Markram for the Support Unit.

During the General Exchange of Views, the next agenda item, the following states parties spoke: Nicaragua, El Salvador, Canada, Switzerland, Belgium (which also spoke on behalf of the EU as current president), Norway, Peru, Australia, Croatia, Japan, Thailand, Mozambique, Zambia, Spain and Brazil.

Several states emphasised the importance of compliance. Contrary to last year’s Meeting of States Parties, a number of states parties referred to Landmine Monitor Report 2001 findings and noted that one state party may have used mines and that several signatories may have violated the treaty during the last year and that all allegations should be dealt with seriously by states parties in the “cooperative spirit” which has characterized this process.

In the afternoon the ICBL distributed Landmine Monitor Report 2001 to delegates. The main findings of the report will be presented tomorrow in Stephen Goose’s statement.

4. Photo exhibition

The legacy of the perfect soldier, an exhibition of images by Italian photographer, Giovanni Diffidenti, was opened at a shopping centre near to the conference venue in Managua. The forty black and white photographs selected for the exhibition have not previously been shown publicly and were taken in Angola, Afghanistan, the Balkans, Cambodia, Laos, Mozambique and Nicaragua. The exhibition is sponsored by UNICEF.

One of Nicaragua’s daily newspapers, La Prensa, carried a photo feature with some of the images from the exhibition on 19 September.