THE LINE of electrical pylons that stretches from Mozambique’s capital, Maputo, to the South African border post of Komatiepoort may look benign, but the land around it contains the deadliest legacy of the country’s troubled past – landmines.
The Portuguese colonial administration sowed Mozambique’s first mines, and later the first post-colonial government – the Frelimo party – used them for “defensive purposes” to protect infrastructure such as pylons from saboteurs during a civil war that tore the country apart for almost two decades. The Renamo opposition also used them.
During a visit to a minefield some 35km from Maputo yesterday, Ireland’s Minister of State for Trade and Development, Jan O’Sullivan, heard that tens of thousands of Russian-made mines were planted along the power route from the capital to the border with South Africa.
Many more were laid in other corners of the country. More than one million people died during the war, and the landmines left behind continue to claim lives.
According to the country’s National Demining Institute, in 2010 there were 15 reported mine incidents which caused seven deaths and 24 injuries.
“The idea that mines were used as weapons of war horrifies me,” said Ms O’Sullivan after she witnessed the controlled explosion of one recently detected mine. “Even now, people who have had to live close to the minefields remain affected.”
For years there was no precise mapping of Mozambique’s mine problem. This led to high death and injury rates and the destruction of social and economic infrastructure.
In 2007 and 2008, an assessment of the remaining suspected hazardous areas was carried out in the central and southern provinces. It found all these areas were affected. Landmines were also found along 200km of the border with Zimbabwe.
Today, Mozambique’s four northern provinces are undergoing a verification process after demining operations concluded. The country’s remaining six provinces are expected to be cleared of mines before a 2014 deadline established under the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Treaty.
The work is slow and painstaking. According to the country’s national mine action plan, between 1993 and 2006, 269 million square metres were demined, 173,091 landmines were cleared and 133,143 items of unexploded ordnance were destroyed.
One of the three international demining organisations working in Mozambique is the Halo Trust, whose operations there have been funded by Irish Aid since 1997. Between 2007 and 2010, Ireland provided just over €1 million to a project targeting mine-affected communities in Mozambique’s central and southern regions.
During that time, the Halo Trust teams cleared 644,060 square metres of mined land, found and destroyed 690 landmines, and handed back 40 cleared minefields to the local population. An Irish Aid assessment identified more than 16,500 direct and 83,473 indirect beneficiaries from the demining.
Mozambique’s action plan for the reduction of poverty has highlighted mine action as one of the key issues negatively affecting the country’s development. The remaining land mines hinder agriculture and economic activities, as well as claiming lives.