NGOs continue anti land mine campaign
The United Nations conference to review the 1980 Convention on Conventional Weapons met in Vienna from September 25 to October 13. The major focus of its discussion was landmines. In a message to the conference, UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali pointed out: "Each year more than 20,000 human beings are wounded or killed by landmines. Most of them are not combatants; they are farmers, women and children. The international community clears approximately 100,000 landmines each year. During the same period, between 2 and 5 million landmines are laid." The meeting was attended by governmental representatives from most of the 53 states that have signed the convention and observers from other governments, UN bodies and non-governmental organisations. The NGOs had a large and active presence, which included presenting petitions containing 1.7 million signatures calling for a complete ban on the use of anti-personnel landmines. Two participants from the Cambodian campaign against landmines who attended were ELIZABETH BERNSTEIN from the Dhammayietra Centre for Peace and Nonviolence and Sister DENISE COGHLAN from the Jesuit Refugee Service. They were interviewed for Green Left Weekly by ALLEN MYERS in Phnom Penh. Question: Can you summarise what happened at the conference in Vienna? EB: The landmines campaign had been gearing up for the conference for several months, planning to use the opportunity to increase public awareness, but at the same time not too hopeful that a total ban on landmines would be adopted, or that the protocol adopted would be much better than what already existed. In fact, the conference failed. The UN announced the failure; governments were so intent on protecting their own stocks of mines that they couldn't agree on a protocol. They were so busy putting in mechanisms to get around the laws they were creating that in the end they had to say that they couldn't agree. But this provided an opportunity for the campaign and the NGOs to get to the media and get public attention and awareness. Activities included public exhibits at the Vienna Town Hall and in the public square in front of the main cathedral and minefield and photo exhibits. The French sent a huge pile of shoes, representing the shoes that would not be needed because of legs being blown off by mines. The conference's inability to agree proves that the previous consensus — that landmines are okay — is broken. As the chairman of the conference, [Swedish ambassador] Johan Molander, said in his closing remarks, the failure had wasted resources and time and money, but it had helped to show that the consensus was broken. So there's still a long road, but it's an opening for us. For example, campaigners from Eastern Europe, since going back to their countries, say they have been deluged with calls from people who want to know more about the campaign. They're shocked that governments can come together and debate about how to protect the stockpiles of mines, and not address the humanitarian issue.
Question: Can you explain how the Vienna conference came about, and how and why the NGOs participated? DC: It's called the UN Convention on Conventional Weapons, which most NGOs call "the convention on inhumane weapons". It was really to look at resolutions about landmines. It was also to take up the question of blinding laser weapons, and hopefully outlaw them before they were ever used in war. There were three preliminary meetings. That included military technical experts, which is often where it bogs down, because the argument becomes about military techniques and manufacture, rather than the moral and humanitarian issues. UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali had made no secret of the fact that he wanted them to ban landmines outright. The 1980 convention really represented a consensus that landmines were a legitimate weapon of war. There were very few riders on their use. And the convention only covered international conflicts, whereas most of the use of landmines is in civil conflicts. At this meeting the NGOs were pushing for an extension of the scope of the convention, to include civil conflicts. We were going to push that there be some mechanism of verification about the use or non-use of landmines, and we pushed that the next review not be in another 15 years — that if they didn't ban landmines totally, then the next review should be in five years. Some governments, who saw themselves as humane and thought we were never going to get the ban, tried to push for things like making sure that landmines were detectable, which would mean they would have to have a certain amount of metal in them. Some, including Australia, were pushing for what they call "self-destruct" mines, so that we couldn't say any more that they were in the ground for years and years causing havoc amongst the civilian population. The actual meeting degenerated into a stupid slanging match about whether they should self-destruct in 24 hours or 365 days or maybe 15 years. EB: The line coming from the United States was that we're supposedly going for the total elimination of mines, but it's not going to happen yet, so countries should be pushed to convert their stocks into so-called "smart" mines. Before the conference the US and the UK held a meeting in Budapest, trying to convince 20 countries to support this line at the conference — basically to continue opening new markets and legitimise the use of smart mines, technology that they have and that other countries which are mine producers don't have.
Question: What is a smart mine? EB: They claim that after a certain amount of time, it has a battery which causes the mine to self-detonate, which would mean that the mine isn't in the ground for 20 years. There was a huge debate on failure rates. DC: NGOs were allowed to speak to the whole assembly. One of the delegates from India said, if a whole field of landmines suddenly self-destructed, would you allow your children to go in there and play the next day? It's all crazy. It's just a military strategy with no conception of what the ordinary poor person in a village in Somalia or Mozambique or Cambodia or Angola is going to think about that. I understand the governments' hesitations, because once you outlaw one weapon of war, landmines, you begin to outlaw all weapons of war. The military say, "Where do you stop?", and of course that's what we want them to say. EB: I think that's one of the major reasons the US, for example, was holding out against more frequent reviews, because with more frequent reviews there are opportunities to discuss other weapons.
Question: What were the main aspects of the NGO intervention at the conference? DC: I think the NGOs saw their role in Vienna as twofold. Most of the people who came from the international campaign saw their role as trying to lobby among the delegates, particularly delegates from their own countries and countries they thought might move on the question. Beyond that, Cambodia particularly played a big role in helping the Austrian campaign to raise public awareness. This was very important because things were in the public media while the conference was going on. An important part was the presence of people who were victimised by landmines from various countries: Angola, Mozambique, Cambodia. There were even two people from the United States, one who'd been injured as a deminer and one who'd been injured as a tourist. And then the chairman, Molander, made a point of going out to receive the signatures on the petitions — the 1.7 million signatures collected in 53 different countries. They were presented by the amputees themselves. The first petitions were presented by an Afghani, who said he was very sorry to have to present them with his left hand [considered impolite in Islamic culture], but he had lost both his legs and his right hand to a mine. On the first Thursday, they gave the whole morning over to the NGOs to make presentations. The NGOs had met together and planned, so that everybody wouldn't be saying the same thing. There were some good speeches from the representatives of the campaign, but I think the speeches from the amputees and the people from the countries that are mined were very important. The other significant thing was that the NGOs produced a newsletter twice a week throughout the conference. The first one praised France for making quite a dramatic statement [announcing a moratorium on the production of anti-personnel mines], so that was received fairly tamely. But the second newsletter had the headline "The good, the bad and the ugly" and evaluated the countries' positions; it created quite a stir. The Australians were furious because they were under the "ugly" as "not a good idea". EB: There was an Austrian guy who had been in Iraq and seen the mines there. He was sitting at the door asking all the delegates to sign the anti-landmines petition: "You're an individual; you can sign in your private capacity". It really was up to the NGOs to explain what it's like to live in a mined country. Few of the delegates had ever even been to a mined country, and they do talk about military objectives only. It was only due to the NGOs — addressing the plenary and through the newsletter — that humanitarian concerns became part of the discussion at all. DC: Many of them came for the first time to the conference. There had been technical input meetings, but for many delegates this was the first one. EB: It was shocking to find out how little many delegates knew about the issue and international law. Countries are sending these people to thrash out the issue, and they have no idea. Many of them didn't know until a week or two before that they were going to Vienna. One of the legal experts for Germany, for instance, came to one of our briefings to inform himself because he knew nothing about it.
Question: Why do you think Australia adopted the position it did at the conference? DC: It's really hard to know why Australia adopted the position that they have. I think they thought they would be helpful: they'd got to the stage that there was no possibility of a ban, so they'd try to come up with some position that would create the least use of landmines. But in so doing they went for the smart mines issue, which meant that the only countries that can have them and get money for them are the ones with the money and the know-how. They were pretty upset with the NGOs [criticism] because I think they thought they were going to get praise and instead they kept ending up on the "ugly" page. Even a couple of human rights lawyers were saying, "Oh well, I guess I'll have to push the Australian position because that's the best of the positions that are there". But when you look at it, it's crazy for the campaign to push that position. EB: It so much toed the US line. The US was protecting its markets and the smart mines of the next generation, and Australia just went along. It makes no sense. At least with the US it makes sense — you know where they're coming from. But Australia?! DC: A journalist told a member of the campaign who was in Australia recently that he thought Australia was trying to develop a smart mine. Now that's something that would be worth finding out. But the only country that did have NGO representation inside its delegation was Australia. I think we do have to give them credit for that.
Question: What was decided at the conference about the next review? EB: Since the conference couldn't agree on a protocol, it was decided to reconvene in January in Geneva to discuss "technical issues" for one week. That means things like the lifetime of the battery in the "smart" mine. And then they will meet to discuss the larger issues for two weeks in the latter half of April in Geneva. The NGOs pleaded for them to meet in a mine-affected country.
Question: Where does the campaign go from here? EB: One of the things we announced at a press conference there was that the lack of consensus showed that governments would have to start listening to the will of the people, as shown by this huge number of petitions. People are enthused now to go back to their countries and work more on raising public awareness, to work on a blacklist of companies that are mine producers. It was announced at the last session that not only would we follow governments and the military to the next meeting, but that we'd target the mine producers. The campaign took up a case here in Cambodia. The European Commission has a Food for Work program. A British company, Hunting Technical Services, was hired to manage it. It came to our attention that this is a sister company of Hunting Engineering, which is a landmine producer. We brought this out at a press conference, and in the end the contract was cancelled. We'll also focus on national legislation. Belgium is the only country in the world which has passed national legislation banning the production, use, export, trade or stockpiling of mines. We're encouraging countries that support a ban to pass such legislation between now and April, to put more pressure on the Geneva meeting. Sweden, Ireland, Italy, maybe a few other countries are on the edge of passing legislation.