Five of the eighteen countries of the Middle East/North Africa region are States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty: Algeria, Jordan, Qatar, Tunisia, and Yemen. Algeria was the most recent to ratify on 9 October 2001. Thirteen states in the region have not joined the treaty: Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and United Arab Emirates. Israel, Jordan, and, most recently, Morocco (19 March 2002) are party to CCW Amended Protocol II.
Jordan and Yemen submitted their annual Article 7 transparency reports for 2001. While Tunisia provided its initial Article 7 Report in July 2000, it has not submitted required annual updates for 2001 or 2002. Qatar has not submitted its initial report, which was due by 27 September 1999. The deadline for Algeria to submit its initial report is 28 September 2002.
Preparations are underway in Yemen to enact domestic legislation implementing the Mine Ban Treaty. Tunisia has said that it is considering additional steps, but no progress has been reported. Jordan applies a 1953 law regulating explosives to implement the Mine Ban Treaty. No measures are known to have taken place to implement the treaty in Algeria and Qatar.
All five States Parties in the region voted in favor of UN General Assembly Resolution 56/24M in November 2001, the annual resolution calling for universalization and implementation of the Mine Ban Treaty. In addition, Bahrain, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates voted in favor of this resolution, as they have done in previous years, despite having not joined the treaty. Among the 19 governments abstaining on the vote were Egypt, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, and Syria.
Delegations from Algeria, Jordan, and Yemen attended the Third Meeting of States Parties in Managua, Nicaragua in September 2001. The delegations from Tunisia and Qatar were unable to attend because of travel problems associated with the events of 11 September 2001. Four non-States Parties attended as observers: Kuwait, Morocco, Oman, and Syria. This was the first time representatives from Syria attended a diplomatic conference related to the Mine Ban Treaty.
Every State Party except Qatar attended at least one meeting of the intersessional Standing Committees in 2002. Non-States Parties participating included Egypt, Israel, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, and Saudi Arabia.
In January 2002, Tunisia hosted a regional seminar promoting the Mine Ban Treaty. Representatives from Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Mauritania, nine donor countries, the United Nations, the ICRC, and the ICBL attended.
Landmine Monitor continues to identify three antipersonnel mine producers in the region—Egypt, Iran, and Iraq—although in each case it is not known if production lines were active in 2001 and 2002. Egyptian officials have stated several times since 1997 that Egypt no longer produces or transfers antipersonnel mines. However, this position has not been issued publicly as a formal policy statement, despite numerous requests from Landmine Monitor and the ICBL. Thus, Landmine Monitor continues to count Egypt as a mine producer.
There is fresh evidence of transfers of antipersonnel mines by Iran, which ostensibly instituted an export moratorium in 1997. Landmine Monitor has received information that mine clearance organizations in Afghanistan are encountering many hundreds of Iranian-manufactured YM-I and YM-I-B antipersonnel mines, dated 1999 and 2000, presumably laid by the Northern Alliance forces in the last few years. Additionally, on 3 January 2002, Israel seized a ship it claimed originated from Iran and was destined for Palestine via the Hezbollah in Lebanon; Israel said that the weapons on the ship included 311 YM-I antipersonnel mines.
Yemen completed the destruction of its antipersonnel mine stockpile on 27 April 2002. Jordan destroyed 10,000 stockpiled antipersonnel mines in April 2002 in its first destruction since December 2000. Tunisia destroyed 1,000 antipersonnel mines in January 2002 in its first destruction since June 1999. Algeria is thought to have a stockpile, but has not declared its size. In 2002, Qatar’s Foreign Minister told the ICBL that Qatar has no stockpile of mines except for training purposes. The deadlines for States Parties to destroy their stockpiles, except those retained for training purposes, are: Qatar (1 April 2003); Jordan (1 May 2003); Tunisia (1 January 2004); and Algeria (1 April 2006).
Three States Parties will retain antipersonnel mines for training and research purposes: Tunisia (5,000); Yemen (4,000); and Jordan (1,000). Algeria and Qatar have not made their plans known.
Qatar, along with Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, and Saudi Arabia, host a combined total of nearly 80,000 antipersonnel mines for the United States as part of pre-positioned ammunition stocks. Qatar would neither confirm nor deny Landmine Monitor’s report of the presence of U.S. antipersonnel mines. Saudi officials confirmed that the U.S. stockpiles mines in Saudi Arabia, but stated that the U.S. cannot use them in Saudi territory.
It is likely that Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, and Syria have large stockpiles of antipersonnel mines. Saudi Arabia confirmed that it possesses a stockpile, and Oman stated for the first time that it has a “limited” stockpile of antipersonnel mines for training purposes. Kuwaiti officials stated that the 45,845 antipersonnel mines Kuwait removed from the ground following the Gulf War and then stored have now been destroyed. Morocco repeated its claim that it no longer has a stockpile of antipersonnel mines.
Landmine Monitor did not receive compelling evidence of any new use of antipersonnel mines in the region in the reporting period. However, Explosive Ordnance Disposal experts reported use of improvised explosive devices and booby-traps by Palestinians at the refugee camp in Jenin. Ministry of Defense sources told Landmine Monitor that Kuwait does not use landmines.
Mines and UXO from the World War II period and from more recent conflicts are encountered in 14 of the 18 countries of the region, all except Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Mines and UXO also affect the Golan Heights, the Occupied Palestinian Territories, and Western Sahara. Estimates of the total number of mines emplaced in the region vary greatly.
A Landmine Impact Survey (LIS) was completed in Yemen in July 2000 and the government has prepared a five-year Strategic Mine Action Plan based on the survey data. Impact surveys are also underway in Lebanon and northern Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan).
According to information available to Landmine Monitor, mine action programs in northern Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan) received more funding in 2001 than anywhere else in the world: a total of $30 million, including $28 million for the UN Mine Action Program, which is funded by the UN Oil for Food Program.
The United Arab Emirates announced in March 2001 its intention to donate up to $50 million to help redevelop South Lebanon, including mine action activities. A memorandum of understanding was signed between the UAE and Lebanon in October 2001; it is not known if any funds for mine action were disbursed in 2001. Apart from the UAE project, Landmine Monitor estimates that approximately $12.6 million was allocated to mine action projects in Lebanon in 2001 by at least 13 donors.
Saudi Arabia announced in May 2001 it would provide $3 million over three years to Yemen’s National Demining Program, but it is not known how much was disbursed in 2001. In 2001, six other donors provided about $3 million to mine action in Yemen.
In 2001, Jordan received about $1.57 million in mine action assistance from three donors (US, Canada, and Norway). The United States provided Egypt with $749,000 in fiscal year 2001 to fund a training program conducted by US military forces and to acquire demining equipment.
In Yemen, 2.2 million square meters of land was cleared from May 2001 to February 2002 in four of the 14 highest priority areas, based on results from the LIS conducted from 1999 to 2000. Since the national demining program began in Jordan in 1993, 124 minefields containing 95,740 mines and covering more than 8 million square meters of land have been cleared.
According to an Iranian military official, from March 2001 to March 2002, 70 million square meters of land was cleared, including more than 3.2 million antipersonnel mines, 914,000 antitank mines, and 4,236 UXO. A new joint project with UNDP is aimed at establishing and implementing an integrated national mine action program.
Iraqi government delays and refusals to grant visas for essential mine action personnel continued to hinder the UN mine clearance program in northern Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan). From 1998 to mid-2002, over 9.7 million square meters of land was cleared under the UN Mine Action Program. In 2001, MAG and NPA cleared more than one million square meters of mine-affected land in Iraqi Kurdistan.
In 2001, the Lebanese Army cleared more than 1.5 million square meters of land; NGOs and foreign armies cleared additional land. UNIFIL completed a technical survey in South Lebanon in 2002 and MAG began a national LIS in March 2002.
Other affected states where mine clearance occurs, sometimes systematically and sometimes sporadically, are Egypt, Israel, Libya, Morocco, and Oman. Mine clearance is carried out by the armed forces in most countries in the region. Egyptian deminers were trained by the United States in the period from May to August 2001. In Western Sahara there have been no humanitarian mine action programs since May 2000.
The need for more Mine Risk Education was reported in Egypt and Iran, as well as Palestine and Western Sahara. Programs were implemented in Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria (including the Golan Heights), and Yemen, as well as northern Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan) and Palestine. Basic MRE has been conducted in Kuwait, while government agencies and local NGOs are reportedly running MRE programs in Algeria, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen, as well as northern Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan) and Palestine.
In Iraq, the ICRC conducted four MRE sessions in March 2001, together with the Iraqi Red Crescent Society. In Lebanon, a National Mine Risk Education Committee was established in April 2001, made up of the major actors in MRE in the country. The Landmines Resource Center is now developing community liaison as a part of its MRE work. In Palestine, the NGO Defense for Children continued its MRE work in 2001, primarily in mine-affected areas, military training zones and the areas of confrontation. Because of the current crisis, local media gave more attention to MRE messages. In Yemen, the Yemen Mine Awareness Association (YMAA) continued its MRE activities focused on communities living close to mined areas.
In 2001 and 2002, there were new mine/UXO casualties reported in 11 countries in the region: Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen. There were also mine incidents in areas such as the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Western Sahara, and northern Iraq.
There is no discernable trend in mine casualties in the few places with data collection mechanisms in the region. In Lebanon, 90 casualties were reported in 2001, down from 113 in 2000. In the Occupied Palestinian Territories, 20 casualties were reported in 2001, up from 11 in 2000. So far in 2002, 45 new casualties have been reported in Palestine to 15 May.
In this reporting period, landmine/UXO casualties also include nationals coming from other mine-affected countries who were killed or injured while abroad engaged in military or demining operations, peacekeeping, or other activities. These include people from Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Morocco, and Syria.
In 2001 and the first half of 2002, incidents during clearance operations or in training exercises caused casualties among deminers in Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, and Yemen. There were unconfirmed reports of demining casualties in several other countries.
The availability of services to mine victims and survivors varies greatly across the region. In Algeria, the ICRC signed an agreement with the Ministry of Health to create a production unit at the Ben Aknoun prosthetic/orthotic center in the north of the capital, Algiers. In Lebanon, the National Demining Office established a National Mine Victim Assistance Committee that includes all the major actors in survivor assistance. The national disability legislation that was approved in May 2000 is not yet in effect. In Syria, a new physiotherapy center opened in Khan Arnaba, close to the mine-affected area. In Yemen, Presidential Law Number Two establishing a care and rehabilitation fund for persons with disabilities came into effect.
