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Key developments since May 2001: Uruguay ratified the Mine Ban Treaty on 7 June 2001 and the treaty entered into force on 1 December 2001. Uruguay submitted its first Article 7 Report on 23 April 2002. Uruguay destroyed 432 antipersonnel mines from May 2000 to June 2002, leaving 1,728 in stock. Uruguayan Army mine clearance experts are serving in the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Uruguay signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 3 December 1997, ratified on 7 June 2001 and the treaty entered into force on 1 December 2001. It has not yet enacted national legislation, but reported the ratification legislation, Law 17.327, as a national implementation measure.[1] Uruguay submitted its initial Article 7 Report on 23 April 2002, covering the period from April 2001 to April 2002.
In September 2001, Uruguay attended the Third Meeting of State Parties in Nicaragua as an observer, represented by the head of the Engineers Department of the Army of Uruguay. In November 2001, Uruguay cosponsored and voted in favor of UN General Assembly Resolution 56/24M supporting the Mine Ban Treaty. Uruguay delivered a statement to the UNGA on behalf of the regional group Mercosur (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay), in which the countries called for universalization of the Mine Ban Treaty.[2] It also voted in support of three resolutions on landmines by the General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS) in June 2001.[3]
From 3-5 December 2001, Uruguay participated in the “Mine Action in Latin America” conference held in Miami.[4] While Uruguay is party to Amended Protocol II (Landmines) to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW), it did not participate in CCW meetings held in Geneva in December 2001. Uruguay also did not attend the Mine Ban Treaty intersessional Standing Committee meetings in January and May 2002.
With regard to the issue of possible joint military operations with a non-State Party who may use antipersonnel mines, the government told Landmine Monitor in April 2002 that Uruguay “does not participate, nor does it plan to participate, in military exercises in which antipersonnel mines are used.”[5]
Uruguay states that it has never produced, exported, or used antipersonnel landmines.[6]
In May 2000, Uruguay had a stockpile of 2,160 antipersonnel mines, including 1,575 M-35 and 585 NR-409 mines, both types manufactured by Belgium. A total of 82 antipersonnel mines were destroyed between May 2000 and May 2001, including three M-35 and 79 NR-409 mines.[7]
On 27 June 2001, Uruguay destroyed 160 antipersonnel mines. Ten NR-409 mines were destroyed in a symbolic destruction event at the Material and Armament Service of the Army’s Second Engineer’s Battalion (Polígono de Destrucción de Munición en Abras de Castellano) in the department of Florida, 100 kilometers north of the capital, Montevideo.[8] Over the course of that day and the next, the Army destroyed 50 M-35 and another 100 NR-409 antipersonnel mines.[9] The stockpile destruction was done by open detonation.[10]
In its Article 7 Report, Uruguay reported a stockpile of 1,928 antipersonnel mines, including 1,522 M-35 and 406 NR-409 mines. This would seemingly indicate that the ten mines destroyed symbolically were not counted.[11]
On 26 June 2002, Uruguay destroyed another 200 antipersonnel mines (100 M-35 and 100 NR-409 mines), at the Army base in Florida department, in the presence of Army personnel, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official, and the Landmine Monitor researcher.[12]
Thus, according to the government’s records, as of July 2002, Uruguay had a stockpile of 1,728 antipersonnel mines, including 1,422 M-35 and 306 NR-409 mines, and had destroyed 432 mines since May 2000, including 153 M-35s and 279 NR-409s.
According to the Article 7 Report, the Army will retain 500 antipersonnel mines for training (400 M-35 and 100 NR-409 mines).[13]
Uruguay declares that it is not mine-affected.[14] While a few Uruguayan nationals have fallen victim to landmines while overseas on military and peacekeeping operations, no new casualties were reported in 2001 or in the first quarter of 2002.
Uruguay has military personnel serving in the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC). According to the Army, they have cleared approximately 100,000 square meters of land from the area where they are stationed.[15] According to a June 2002 report by the UN Secretary-General, the Uruguayan engineering company, located in Kisangani, is also providing demining specialists to aid an investigation into an incident near Ikela in which a vehicle carrying two UN military observers on patrol detonated an antivehicle mine.[16]
In the past Uruguay has participated in UN peacekeeping missions in Angola, Cambodia, Mozambique, and Nicaragua. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the soldiers have acquired valuable experience in mine clearance in these missions.[17]
The Army provides an annual, month-long course on humanitarian demining for approximately ten officers at a time, using inert mines only.[18] This course would be in its tenth year, but in 2002 was suspended for the first time because of budget shortfalls.[19]
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[1] Article 7 Report, Form A, submitted 23 April 2002, covering the period April 2001 to April 2002.
[2] Statement by Ambassador Felipe Paolillo, Permenent Representative of Uruguay to the United Nations on behalf of MERCOSUR and Associated States, UNGA 56th session, 26 October 2001.
[3] On 5 June 2001, Uruguay voted in favor of Resolutions AG/1792, AG/1793 and AG/1794 of the General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS), supporting mine action in Peru and Ecuador, the mine clearance program in Central America, and the goal of the western hemisphere as an antipersonnel landmine-free zone, respectively.
[4] The Conference was sponsored by: the US Department of Defense; the Mine Action Information Center of James Madison University; the Organization of American States (OAS); the US Southern Command; and the US Department of State. See http://hdic.jmu.edu/conferences/latinamerica/.
[5] National Army response to Landmine Monitor questionnaire 2002, undated, received in April 2002.
[6] Article 7 Report, Forms E and H, 23 April 2002; National Army response to Landmine Monitor questionnaire, February 1999; National Army response to Landmine Monitor questionnaire, May 2001.
[7] National Army response to Landmine Monitor questionnaire, May 2001. A letter dated 19 November 1997 from former Defense Minister Raúl Iturria in response to a question from National Deputy Gabriel Barandiaran revealed that, as of November 1997, the Armed Forces had a total of 2,338 antipersonnel mines (1,604 M-35 mines and 734 NR-409 mines). See Landmine Monitor Report 1999, p. 311.
[8] The Landmine Monitor researcher was present for the destruction, as were Army personnel and a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official.
[9] Letter (Nota No. 014/F/01) from Colonel Wile Purtscher, Chief of the Department of Engineers, Armed Forces Chiefs of Staff, to Landmine Monitor, 25 July 2001.
[10] National Army response to Landmine Monitor questionnaire, May 2001.
[11] Article 7 Report, Forms B and G, 23 April 2002. According to the report, between April 2001 and April 2002, 228 stockpiled antipersonnel mines were destroyed (53 M-35 and 175 NR-409 mines).
[12] The destruction was originally scheduled to destroy 278 antipersonnel mines (172 M-35 and 106 NR-409 mines). See Article 7 Report, Form F, 23 April 2002.
[13] Article 7 Report, Form D, 23 April 2002.
[14] Article 7 Report, Form C, 23 April 2002.
[15] National Army response to Landmine Monitor questionnaire, April 2002.
[16] Eleventh report of the UN Secretary-General on the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (S/2002/621), 5 June 2002, p. 5.
[17] Ministry of Foreign Affairs response to Landmine Monitor questionnaire, dated 5 April 2002, presented to Landmine Monitor by Dr. Alvaro Moerzinger, Director General, International Political Affairs, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with a cover letter dated 10 April 2002.
[18] National Army response to Landmine Monitor questionnaire, April 2002.
[19] Interview with Lieutenant Alvaro Urse, 26 June 2002.
