AFGHANISTAN| SOUT EAST ASIA | SRI LANKA |
Map  History of minelaying In Sri Lanka, landmines were laid by both the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Government of Sri Lanka, to protect military bases and defensive areas. Following the February 2002 ceasefire agreement, both sides made demining a priority; that is until fighting resumed in August 2006. HALO’s programme is concentrated in Jaffna where the emphasis has been on clearance to resettle those displaced by conflict and the tsunami. The great majority of mines in Jaffna were laid in well-structured belts by the military through successive advances during the 1990s. Some nuisance mining also took place, though this was largely a tactic of the LTTE. The great majority of mines are anti-personnel types. The population density in Jaffna is such that virtually all the mine-belts were impacting on the civilian population. HALO, working with the Government on prioritisation, has focussed its assets on these belts where the majority of civilian accidents were taking place. Since the resumption of the war the A9 road linking Jaffna Peninsula to the mainland has been sealed and the supply of goods has slowed to a trickle. In this environment there is significant pressure on the land in order to grow food. In 2002 HALO completed a survey of all government controlled areas, accurately identifying the exact boundaries of dangerous areas, gathering both socio-economic data and technical data to assist in clearance, and prioritising the sites by humanitarian requirement. On the Jaffna Peninsula HALO has trained hundreds of local Tamil staff to conduct demining supervised by a small team of experienced expatriates. The deminers are split into seven-man manual sections and are supported by two mechanical vegetation cutters. In addition there has been a requirement to clear technically difficult minefields such as those found in Jaffna town, where defensive-works built from rubble have been seeded with mines. It was beyond the capability of the existing national assets to clear such rubble, and HALO deployed 13 armoured mechanical clearance units supported by armoured tipper trucks and a specially modified rock-crusher to process the spoil (a technique pioneered in the ruins of Kabul city in the mid-1990s). HALO utilises a specially adapted timber-shredder to destroy effectively and efficiently the anti-personnel mines as they are removed (negating the need for excess quantities of explosive in a volatile security environment). HALO Sri Lanka has 360 local staff working in Jaffna Division. This emergency intervention has made rapid progress in reducing the size of the problem. A further full year of clearance, with deminer numbers maintained as they are, should see the last remaining mine concentrations removed, thus fulfilling the Government of Sri Lanka’s wish for a mine impact free Jaffna by the end of 2009. Requirement for continued clearance HALO has received funding from the European Commission, ECHO and the governments of Japan, Finland, USA, The Netherlands and Britain. Additional funding has been received from Swiss Fondation Pro-Victimis, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, Rotary International, The Cooperative Bank, The California Community Foundation, One Sri Lanka Foundation, The Julia Burke Foundation, People to People International and The Humpty Dumpty Institute. There has been no humanitarian clearance of High Security Zones, access to which remains tightly restricted by the military. Should a comprehensive peace settlement be made, and these large areas returned to the civilian population, they too will require full scale clearance which will take many years to complete. |
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