South Africa fails to support landmine ban

By Norm Dixon Human rights and peace movement activists are outraged that the ANC-led South African government has refused to support a ban on the production and export of landmines. Activists had high hopes that the ANC, whose members have experienced first-hand the horror of these weapons, would back a complete ban at the September UN conference in Vienna which reviewed international conventions on landmines. The decision to oppose a complete ban reportedly caused a split in cabinet. Anti-landmine sentiment is on the rise internationally and locally as campaigners explain the deadly nature of these weapons and the terrible toll they are continuing to take, in many cases long after the conflicts in which they were deployed have come to an end. South Africa's Department of Foreign Affairs claimed that its position at the Vienna conference — to move away from the use of some landmines — makes South Africa a world leader on the issue. Foreign affairs deputy director-general Abdul Minty proposed amendments to the Convention on Prohibitions and Restrictions on Certain Conventional Weapons to support the development of "short-life" landmines — mines which can be timed to self-destruct after a specified period of time. This proposal was slammed by Ceasefire Campaign, a South African peace group which represents 40 organisations supporting the International Campaign to Ban Landmines. "Whether landmines are 'short-life' or 'long-life', they are still incapable of discriminating between their victims, be they enemy or friendly soldiers, ordinary civilians or children", Ceasefire coordinator David Bruce told the South African Weekly Mail and Guardian. Accepting short-life or "smart" mines endorses the use of landmines in general, Bruce said. "In supporting the use of 'smart' mines the South African government is aligning itself with more affluent nations for whom the use of these more costly landmines is affordable. "Amongst developing nations South Africa is not alone in this. The Indian government is another of the 13 'less developed' nations represented at the conference which has expressed its support for 'smart' mines. Considering the costs of conversion from 'dumb' to 'smart' mines and the variety of ways in which all types of landmines obstruct development, it is difficult to see how anyone can reconcile the use of 'smart' mines with the interests of less affluent countries. "The South African government has demonstrated a lack of real concern or understanding regarding the international landmine crisis. There are an estimated 85 to 110 million unexploded landmines scattered in over 60 countries worldwide. These weapons kill or maim between 600 and 1200 people a month. De-mining programs are currently managing to remove roughly 100,000 landmines per year. A further 2-5 million landmines are being laid each year. Most of these are 'dumb' anti-personnel landmines. But even if they were all 'smart' mines, and only 10% failed to de-activate [a figure accepted by military experts], simple arithmetic tells us that there will still continue to be an escalation in the scale of the global landmine problem", Bruce said. Minty defended the South African government position saying that its proposals represented the first step to an all-out ban on landmines, and that it was important to have a convention worded to encourage more countries to sign. He said that South Africa was proposing to make it illegal for treaty states to sell mines to non-treaty states, prohibit non-detectable mines, put restrictions on the use of mines to minimise civilian casualties, and extend the convention to restrict the use of mines in civil war. South Africa recently announced that its arms industry would no longer "market, export and transit" long-life anti-personnel landmines. The government also apologised to Angola for the disastrous results of landmines planted by the South African Defence Force when the apartheid regime backed Jonas Savimbi's terrorist UNITA forces. A South African company, Mechem, has also recently won a UN contract to remove landmines in Angola.