The
EU continues to reinforce its commitment against Antipersonnel Landmines. In
rapid pace a series of steps have been taken:
In March 2000 the European Commission issued a Communication and put forward
a draft Regulation on the reinforcement of the EU contribution to the fight
against Landmines.
In that year, the overall EU (Member States and European Community)
contributions to the APL issues already reached the record amount of € 125
million.
In July 2001 the Council and the European Parliament adopted two Regulations
on the Reinforcement of the EU response against Antipersonnel Landmines –
the first one covering developing countries (1724/2001) and the second one
covering other countries (1725/2001); the regulations, (referred to as the APL
Regulation -in the singular-) lay the foundations for a European integrated and
focused policy.
In parallel, the EU Member States and the European Community together,
increased their joint contribution to a new record figure of € 145
million.
In 2002, the adoption of a multi-annual 2002-2004 Strategy and Programming
paper for this APL instrument is underway
2001: The
objectives pursued by the EC instruments in 2001 were:
Making de-mining more efficientby
helping mine affected countries to acquire the appropriate capacity (e.g.
data, skills, equipment, software etc.) to prioritise demining
increasing the efficiency of operations on the ground through measurement of
performance and progress, by comparisons between different operations and
measurement of longer term impact.
Reinforcing Mine Clearance
interventions
in interaction and complementarity between geographic and thematic
instruments
and according to humanitarian, socio-economic and political
priorities.
In co-operation with UNMAS the EU has supported Landmine
Impact Surveys in 6 countries, among which Afghanistan. The Union has
furthermore produced a Study on the Performance and Evaluation of EC contracts,
aiming at improving the procedures in order to strengthen the overall
effectiveness of EC funded mine action programmes.
Mine clearance/awareness activities have been pursued in 10 countries.
EC assistance in 2001
amounted to € 30, 885 million,
supported 13 mine affected countries
and contributed to the world-wide efforts made in Science and Technology
related activities such as Test and Evaluation
and provided follow-up to multi-sensors programmes launched in
2000.
2002: This year the new legal instrument will be used
for the first time through the abovementioned multi-annual Strategy for the
years 2002-2004. This document contains
an overall approach, The Strategy, for 2002-2004,
and a detailed multi-annual Indicative Programming, which will make the EC
assistance predictable and coherent.
It integrates and complements the annual and multi-annual commitments to be
undertaken under geographic strategies and instruments by the European
Community. Its financial framework amounts to approximately €110 million.
Its underlying principle is that the EC efforts
in this field should be directly related to the goals set by the international
community.
The EC Strategy, is thus
closely related to the UN Strategy for Mine Action 2001-2005,
and pursues in a mutually reinforcing way focused objectives which are
either common with or complementary to the UN
Strategy.
Finally:
EC mine action is not geared to be a technical measure;
it is the response to humanitarian, developmental and political concerns.
Mine Action aims at stabilising post or frozen conflict regions, recreating
an environment in which people can live safely and in which economic, health and
social development can occur free from constraints imposed by the hidden threat
of mines, and ensuring victims needs are addressed.
Therefore, this Landmine Policy is geared to address the problems faced by
the populations in context, and reduce the mine threat to affected
populations (mine clearance / area reduction).
The Commission has
taken upon itself the double mission
of facilitating donors’ co-ordination in beneficiary countries in
order to rapidly equip them with the appropriate capacity to manage efficiently
their mine issues
and to promote measurement of mine action on the ground with the aim of
improving efficiency, openness in funds dispersal and therefore better use of
the financial resources available.
The Convention on the
Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel
Mines and on their Destruction (MBT) set the political scene for the elaboration
and adoption of the APL Regulation. It remains for the EC the leading light of
the APL Strategy 2002-2004.
