ICBL briefs the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council at NATO Headquarters

(Tuesday 18 November 2003 Brussels, Belgium) On 11 November 2003, representatives of the ICBL briefed the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC)’s Political Committee on the major findings of the Landmine Monitor Report 2003 (LM). The briefing took place at NATO headquarters, in Brussels.

ICBL representatives included Sheree Bailey and Stanislas Brabant of Handicap International Belgium and Iouri Zagoumennov of the Belarus CBL. Participants included representatives of all of the 46 EAPC countries, except for Turkmenistan. The meeting was chaired by Ambassador Simmons (United States).

Stan introduced the ICBL and the Landmine Monitor. Sheree gave an overview of the situation of landmine survivors in EAPC countries. Stan described the progress and problems of use and production in the EAPC region, showed how the Mine Ban Treaty (MBT) responds to such problems and mentioned the progress in universalizing the MBT and destroying stockpiles. Iouri then described the Belarus experience, and the role of civil society in “gradually widening the democracy corridor” that led to the accession of Belarus to the Mine Ban Treaty (MBT) on 3 September 2003. He invited participants to a MBT implementation workshop in Minsk, on 8-9 December. Stan concluded the presentation by calling on non States Parties to join the MBT, and if they could not do so now, to take interim measures to indicate their commitment to ridding the world of antipersonnel landmines.

Denmark and The Netherlands raised the question of assisting non-States Parties with stockpile destruction and how the Partnership for Peace (PfP) could encourage accession to the treaty.

Switzerland described the Landmine Monitor as a very important tool and the PfP as a very appropriate forum to tackle the landmine issue, and said it looked forward to the briefing that the GICHD shall be giving to the PfP next week.

Turkey asked whether the MBT included any provisions preventing support to non-States Parties.

Canada thanked speakers for the excellent briefing and said a distinction should be made between stockpile destruction and mine clearance.

Ukraine said it had just completed a very successful stockpile destruction project with NAMSA, and declared that it had problems with the 4-year deadline.

Russia thanked the speakers for the briefing and described Russian stockpiles as “huge.” The representative informed the meeting that Russia had prepared a proposal for NAMSA in order to destroy 10 million PFM mines within 2 to 3 years and hoped this issue to be considered in 2 weeks, at a meeting at ambassadorial level. He described the MBT deadlines as too short to destroy all PMN mines present on the Russian territory, in particular in view of the high number of mines left over after World War 2. He stated that Russia was “at the beginning of achieving the principles of the MBT” and proposed to use Russian technology for destruction of PFM mines.