Latest news with #2024LandmineMonitor
Japan Times
08-04-2025
- Politics
- Japan Times
Pivot by some countries toward landmine use appalls experts
Moves by five NATO countries to quit a treaty banning the use of landmines have experts worried, ahead of a Geneva meeting aiming to boost efforts on ridding the world of the explosive ordnance. The decisions announced by Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland over the past three weeks are "a dangerous setback for the protection of civilians in armed conflict," the International Committee of the Red Cross said. The first four countries said in a March 18 joint statement that "Russia's aggression" — evinced by its all-out invasion of Ukraine — forced them to start moves to pull out of the 1997 Ottawa Treaty aimed at eliminating anti-personnel landmines. Finland followed suit last week with a similar announcement. The steps come ahead of a three-day meeting starting Wednesday in Geneva organised by the U.N. Mine Action Service (UNMAS) and the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD). Tobias Privitelli, head of the GICHD, admitted to reporters that the meeting would take place in a "challenging environment." Progress made over decades in ridding the world of landmines was at risk, he said. UNMAS's head of policy and advocacy, James Staples, said nearly 60 countries or territories, from Ukraine to Myanmar to Sudan and Syria, are affected by explosive ordinance, and "millions of people suffer from their impact on a daily basis." Adding to the headwinds faced by their two organizations was U.S. funding cuts to foreign aid. While the United States is not among the 160 signatories of the Ottawa Treaty, it had been the single biggest national funder of mine action. Washington had been providing over $300 million a year, or around 40% of total international support, according to the 2024 Landmine Monitor. "The funding that they have provided ... has undoubtedly saved lives and made a difference to hundreds of thousands," Staples said. While some short-term waivers have been granted to some programmes, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) cautioned that long-term funding was uncertain, with thousands of trained deminers currently sidelined. In the three decades of the treaty's existence, the number of people killed or maimed by landmines went from 25,000 to below 5,800 in 2023, and millions of landmines destroyed worldwide, according to the Landmine Monitor. Staples said that, when other types of explosive remnants of war, like cluster munitions and IEDs (improvised explosive devices), were factored in, the number of casualties reached around 15,000 in 2023. The vast majority of victims of explosive ordnance — 85% — are civilians, and more than half of them are children, Privitelli noted. He said that, in many territories, the threat of landmines lingers for decades after the end of a conflict, posing a persistent hidden threat.
Yahoo
07-04-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Super Rat: the record-setting rodent sniffing out landmines and saving lives
Rats don't always have the best reputations, but one named Ronin with a super sense of smell is working to change that. Ronin and his landmine-sniffing rat pack are making a name for rodents everywhere by saving innocent civilians from hidden explosives. The African giant pouched rat recently set a new world record for the most landmines detected by a rat. Between August 2021 and February 2025, Ronin uncovered 109 landmines and 15 other pieces of unexploded ordnance in a region close to Siem Reap in Cambodia, according to Guinness World Records. 'Ronin's achievements are a testament to the incredible potential of rats,' his main handler Phanny told the Guinness publication. Landmines are a major issue in former conflict zones. The explosive weapons, hidden in the ground, are designed to injure or kill anyone who passes over them. In Cambodia alone, they have caused more than 65,000 deaths and injuries since the fall of the brutal Khmer Rouge regime in 1979, according to the Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor. Their use is controversial because of their indiscriminate nature and the threat they pose for decades after a conflict has ended, killing and maiming and hampering land development in war-ravaged areas. They are also notoriously difficult and dangerous to detect. That's where rats come in; their high intelligence, speed and keen sense of smell make them adept at identifying explosives. They are also too light to trigger landmines. It's crucial work. An estimated 110 million landmines are still buried in over 60 countries around the world, said landmine detection nonprofit APOPO. In 2023, landmines caused 5,757 casualties globally — 37% of which involved children, according to the 2024 Landmine Monitor. Ronin is one of more than 100 rats trained by APOPO to detect the scent of the explosive chemicals and point landmines out to their handlers. The rats are highly versatile and have also been trained to detect tuberculosis in medical settings, helping to prevent the spread of infectious disease. The Belgian nonprofit's team of landmine-sniffing rats can search an area the size of a tennis court in 30 minutes – something that could take a deminer with a metal detector up to four days. Ronin, who is 5 years old and was born in Tanzania, is much larger than your average pet rat. He is more than 2 feet long – about the length of a cat – and weighs 2.6 pounds, according to APOPO. Cambodia's Preah Vihear province, where Ronin was deployed has one of the highest landmine densities in the world following decades of conflict in the 20th century, including heavy bombing by the US during the Vietnam War. The US dropped 2.7 million tons of ordnance – including cluster bombs and submunitions – in a four-year carpet-bombing campaign in Cambodia. Up to a quarter of the cluster bombs failed to explode, meaning they stayed active and dangerous but out of sight, according to a 2019 report by the US Congressional Research Service. Despite years of demining efforts, there are still an estimated 4 to 6 million unexploded landmines in Cambodia, according to APOPO. Ronin claims the world record from Magawa, another rat trained by APOPO who identified 71 landmines and 38 pieces of unexploded ordnance during his five-years of service. Magawa passed peacefully in January 2022.
CNN
07-04-2025
- General
- CNN
Super Rat: the record-setting rodent sniffing out landmines and saving lives
Rats don't always have the best reputations, but one named Ronin with a super sense of smell is working to change that. Ronin and his landmine-sniffing rat pack are making a name for rodents everywhere by saving innocent civilians from hidden explosives. The African giant pouched rat recently set a new world record for the most landmines detected by a rat. Between August 2021 and February 2025, Ronin uncovered 109 landmines and 15 other pieces of unexploded ordnance in a region close to Siem Reap in Cambodia, according to Guinness World Records. 'Ronin's achievements are a testament to the incredible potential of rats,' his main handler Phanny told the Guinness publication. Landmines are a major issue in former conflict zones. The explosive weapons, hidden in the ground, are designed to injure or kill anyone who passes over them. In Cambodia alone, they have caused more than 65,000 deaths and injuries since the fall of the brutal Khmer Rouge regime in 1979, according to the Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor. Their use is controversial because of their indiscriminate nature and the threat they pose for decades after a conflict has ended, killing and maiming and hampering land development in war-ravaged areas. They are also notoriously difficult and dangerous to detect. That's where rats come in; their high intelligence, speed and keen sense of smell make them adept at identifying explosives. They are also too light to trigger landmines. It's crucial work. An estimated 110 million landmines are still buried in over 60 countries around the world, said landmine detection nonprofit APOPO. In 2023, landmines caused 5,757 casualties globally — 37% of which involved children, according to the 2024 Landmine Monitor. Ronin is one of more than 100 rats trained by APOPO to detect the scent of the explosive chemicals and point landmines out to their handlers. The rats are highly versatile and have also been trained to detect tuberculosis in medical settings, helping to prevent the spread of infectious disease. The Belgian nonprofit's team of landmine-sniffing rats can search an area the size of a tennis court in 30 minutes – something that could take a deminer with a metal detector up to four days. Ronin, who is 5 years old and was born in Tanzania, is much larger than your average pet rat. He is more than 2 feet long – about the length of a cat – and weighs 2.6 pounds, according to APOPO. Cambodia's Preah Vihear province, where Ronin was deployed has one of the highest landmine densities in the world following decades of conflict in the 20th century, including heavy bombing by the US during the Vietnam War. The US dropped 2.7 million tons of ordnance – including cluster bombs and submunitions – in a four-year carpet-bombing campaign in Cambodia. Up to a quarter of the cluster bombs failed to explode, meaning they stayed active and dangerous but out of sight, according to a 2019 report by the US Congressional Research Service. Despite years of demining efforts, there are still an estimated 4 to 6 million unexploded landmines in Cambodia, according to APOPO. Ronin claims the world record from Magawa, another rat trained by APOPO who identified 71 landmines and 38 pieces of unexploded ordnance during his five-years of service. Magawa passed peacefully in January 2022.
Arab News
04-04-2025
- Politics
- Arab News
Red Cross warns of continued threat of landmines in Iraq
LONDON: The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Friday that landmines and explosive remnants of war continue to pose a severe threat in Iraq, contaminating an estimated 2,100 sq. km. In a statement issued to coincide with the International Day for Mine Awareness, the organization said landmines from past conflicts, including the Iran-Iraq War and the 2014–17 battle against Daesh, remained a major hazard. The contamination had resulted in civilian casualties, forced displacement, restricted farmland access and slowed reconstruction efforts, it said. Between 2023 and 2024, the ICRC recorded 78 casualties from landmines and remnants of war in Iraq. Earlier this year, three students were killed in an explosion in Abu Al-Khasib, Basra. The ICRC has appealed for greater efforts to reduce contamination and support mine-affected communities. Clearance operations continue in cooperation with national authorities and humanitarian partners. The call for action comes at a time when several NATO member states, namely Poland, Finland and the Baltic states, have signaled their intention to withdraw from the Ottawa Convention, the international treaty banning antipersonnel landmines. They cited the growing military threat from Russia as the reason for reconsidering the ban. Meanwhile, the US, previously the largest funder of global mine clearance efforts, has cut back support due to a foreign aid review under the Trump administration. Washington had contributed over $300 million annually, covering 40 percent of total international mine action funding, according to the 2024 Landmine Monitor report, which led to major clearance efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Laos. A State Department official said last month that the US had restarted some global humanitarian demining programs but provided no details.
