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Key developments since May 2000: In cooperation with Syrian authorities, UN peacekeeping forces in the Golan Heights have initiated a program to identify and mark all mined areas in their area of operations. A mine awareness component is included in the Ministry of Health’s “Safe Gardens Project,” initiated in August 2000. The Syrian Campaign to Ban Landmines was launched on 4 July 2000.
Syria’s reasons for not joining the Mine Ban Treaty remain unchanged. While expressing concern about landmine victims in the world, Syrian Foreign Ministry officials continue to state that antipersonnel landmines are necessary defensive weapons, and cite Israel’s occupation of the Golan Heights as the main reason why Syria is unable to join the treaty.[1]
Syria did not attend the Second Meeting of States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty in September 2000 nor did it participate in any meetings of the intersessional Standing Committees. As in previous years, Syria abstained from voting on the November 2000 UN General Assembly resolution urging universalization of the Mine Ban Treaty. Syria is not party to Convention on Conventional Weapons and has made no statements on landmines at the Conference on Disarmament.
A Syrian official described Landmine Monitor Report 2000 as containing valuable information and commended the humanitarian efforts of the ICBL. He also stated the belief that by not placing the Golan Heights in the country report on Syria, Landmine Monitor was taking a “political position in full contradiction with International legality....”[2]
On 4 July 2000 the Syrian Campaign to Ban Landmines was launched during an event at the Damascus Cultural Center. A lecture on landmines in the Golan was held on 21 September 2000 in Mazza Cultural Center, which included presentation of a short film on the Golan. The Syrian daily newspaper covered parts of the lecture. Syrian media also covered the ICBL and Syrian campaign’s activities during the Second Meeting of States Parties.[3] Al-Manar TV (based in Lebanon) marked the anniversary of entry into force of the Mine Ban Treaty on 1 March 2001 by airing a program on the mine situation in Lebanon and Syria. A team from this TV channel visited Syria and bordering areas, met mine victims from the Golan, and interviewed officials from the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Information.
No new information on these subjects was made available during the reporting period. At some point in the past Syria may have produced and exported antipersonnel mines, but it is not known if this activity has occurred in recent years.[4] Syria has not taken any unilateral measures to prohibit future production or export of antipersonnel mines. Syria stockpiles antipersonnel mines but the size and origin of the stockpile is not known. It is not known whether Syrian troops currently stationed in Lebanon possess antipersonnel mines.
The Golan is divided into three areas: Syrian controlled, Israeli controlled, and a buffer zone monitored by the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF). Each contains mined areas. In 2000, UNDOF, in cooperation with Syrian authorities, began a program to identify and mark all minefields within its area of operations.[5] According to UNDOF, “The Minefield Security Program has led to the identification and marking of numerous known as well as previously unidentified minefields in the area of separation.”[6]
The degree to which other parts of Syria are affected by mines is not clear. At least one of Syria’s neighbors, Jordan, deployed nearly 67,000 antipersonnel mines along its border with Syria prior to 1973. It has also been reported that Turkey’s border with Syria is mined.[7] However, the director of the Syrian Healthy Villages Program, which covers all bordering and rural areas, stated that landmines do not affect the border areas with Turkey and Jordan.[8]
No information is available on Syrian mine clearance in 2000, and the amount of funding dedicated to mine action in Syria is not available.
About 200 Syrian soldiers are involved in demining activities in Lebanon.[9]
A mine awareness component is included in the Ministry of Health’s “Safe Gardens Project,” which aims to create safe and attractive places for children to play in targeted border areas, including the Golan. Six safe gardens were opened in six villages and towns in 2000, in Goba, Bir Ajam, Gabbata, Nabea Al Sakhre, Hamidia, and Khan Arnaba. The Minister of Health conducted the opening ceremony on 16 August 2000 and schools celebrated this event from 4-6 September 2000.[10] In addition to lectures and public meetings, 162 school children participated in a drawing exhibition on landmine victims and posters made from the best drawings were used in schools and public centers to create and promote mine awareness.[11]
On 20 March 2001, two more Safe Gardens were opened by the British Ambassador and Syrian health officials in Khan Arnaba area, close to the Golan. The British Embassy in Syria covered the cost in cooperation with the Syrian Ministry of Health.[12]
UNDOF supported UNICEF in mine awareness activities among the civilian population in the Golan.[13]
According to the Director of Health in the Bordering Areas (Golan) no new mine victims were reported in the year 2000.[14] However, mine victim data is not systematically collected in Syria. It has been reported in the Syrian media that in recent years there were more than 185 victims of landmines, 20 of whom died.[15] A wire service story from Lebanon noted that two Syrian mine experts were wounded in Lebanon since the Israeli withdrawal in May 2000.[16]
Rosters maintained by the local societies for the disabled were made available to Landmine Monitor. The rosters list 63 people of whom the majority are victims of mines and UXO. The injuries include: five female victims, thirty-five amputations of the lower limb, fifteen amputations of the upper limb, ten cases of blindness, one unspecified eye injury, and two “other deformities.”
Basic health and social services continue to be provided free of charge by the Syrian government. The services include medical care, physical rehabilitation, prosthetics, wheelchairs, and special education, but most of the services are available through public centers and hospitals within Damascus, far from the mine-affected areas. To remedy this lack of facilities, the government health program will establish a physiotherapy center next year close to the affected area to serve the population.[17]
A number of NGOs are working to raise awareness of landmines and their victims in Syria; two of these local NGOs are organizations for the disabled. The Syrian Society for the Physically Disabled in Qunitra was founded in November of 1998 and serves the disabled in the border areas including the areas of separation and Qunitra. It is chaired by Hazem Haj Ahmed, who is disabled.[18] The second NGO is the Syrian Society for the Blind in Qunitra, founded in July 1997, and headed by, Chaman Al-Mohaya, a blind landmine victim.[19]
Some societies and health workers participated in a symposium on 19-20 June 2001 on voluntarism, attended by three ministers; they discussed mine awareness activities and data collection strategies for landmine victims.[20]
There are no laws or decrees to aid landmine victims or the disabled in Syria and no know internationally funded mine action or victim assistance programs in Syria.
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[1] Interview with Foreign Ministry official, 22 January 2001.
[2] Letter to Landmine Monitor from Taher Al-Hussami, Acting Permanent Representative of Syria to the UN in Geneva, 27 September 2000. The letter is available in full on the Landmine Monitor web site at www.icbl.org/lm/comments/ Landmine Monitor does not take positions on political, territorial or sovereignty issues. A separate report on Golan is included only because it is an area specially affected by mines. Similarly, Landmine Monitor has separate reports on, for example, Chechnya, Somaliland, Kosovo, and Northern Iraq, without any intention to make political or legal judgments.
[3] The Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) circulated a press release on the role of ICBL and the Second Meeting of States Parties on 11 September 2000 and two official daily newspapers, Tichrin and Al-Baath, published the release on 12 September 2000. The NGO Yarmouk for Information is the coordinator of the campaign. Other members include Al-Cham Permanent Office of Societies for Libraries and The Afro-Arab Federation for the Aged.
[4] See Landmine Monitor Report 2000, p. 958. Jordan has reported possession of Syrian-made mines in the past.
[5] “Report of the UN Secretary General on the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, for the period from 23 May to 21 November 2000” (S/2000/1103), 17 November 2000, p. 1.
[6] “Report of the UN Secretary General on the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, for the period from 22 November 2000 to 18 May 2001” (S/2001/499), 18 May 2001, pp. 1-2.
[7] “Turkey Hindered by Own Landmines on Syrian Border,” Reuters, 6 December 1996.
[8] Interview with the Director of the Healthy Villages Program, 28 February 2001.
[9] Landmine Monitor/Lebanon interview with Col. Roland Abou Jaoudeh, Beirut, 3 July 2001.
[10] Tichrin (official daily newspaper in Damascus), Issue No: 7781, 19 August 2000, p. 2.
[11] Interview with Dr. Doghous, Director of Health Center - Khan Arnaba and the coordinator of the Safe Garden Project, 1 September 2000.
[12] Correspondence from the Director of Health in the Bordering Areas, 29 May 2001.
[13] “Report of the UN Secretary General on the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, for the period from 22 November 2000 to 18 May 2001” (S/2001/499), 18 May 2001, p. 2.
[14] Interview with the Director of Health in the Bordering Areas, 5 November 2000.
[15] Tichrin, Issue No: 7781, 19 August 2000, p. 2.
[16] Dalal Saoud, “Mine, bombs kill 2 in south Lebanon,” UPI (Beirut), 29 April 2001.
[17] Interview with Dr. Rabi Othman, Director of the Government Health Center in Qunitra, 30 October 2000.
[18] Correspondence with Dr. Rabi Othman, Director of the Health Center in Qunitra, 5 November 2000.
[19] Ibid.
[20] The Cham Office of Libraries and Documents is organized this symposium in cooperation with Damascus Directorate of Culture and the Arab Club for Information in honor of the International Year of Volunteers, 2001.
