Long, Slow War on Land Mines : Gain at Geneva meeting is just a fraction of what is needed

Yesterday, if it was an average day, 13 people died when they stepped on land mines somewhere in the world. Thirty more were wounded, many losing a foot or a leg. The numbers will be about the same today and probably for all the days of decades to come.

Of the more than 400 million land mines that have been laid since World War II, up to 110 million are still active in the soil of 64 countries. Most victims are civilians. That’s why more than 30 countries as well as the United Nations and the International Red Cross want to outlaw these indiscriminate weapons. At a recent U.N. conference in Geneva, many argued for such a ban. They lost.

The Geneva meeting did revise the rules on land mines agreed to in 1980. When the new protocol comes into force next year, the use or transfer of so-called “dumb” or undetectable antipersonnel mines, many made of plastic or even wood, will be outlawed. Mines that continue to be used will have to contain a certain amount of metal to make them detectable by sensing instruments. Mines scattered by artillery shells or helicopters will be required either to self-destruct or to deactivate themselves in a given period. Assuring compliance with these provisions will be a challenge.

A number of countries have eliminated antipersonnel mines from their arsenals and will continue pressing for a worldwide ban. Canada, which will host a meeting in September to rally support for a ban, has usefully proposed as a feasible step a “land-mine-free zone” in the Western Hemisphere, an initiative on which discussions have already begun.

Support for outlawing antipersonnel mines has been growing in the United States. The Pentagon has raised few objections, though it does seek limited exceptions, for example South Korea’s border with North Korea. Clearly the enormous long-term danger posed by mines, especially to nonmilitary populations, vastly outweighs their short-term battlefield benefits. It’s time for Washington to move closer to supporting a total ban.

Delegates at the Geneva meeting observed a minute of silence for the estimated 14,586 people killed or maimed since last October, when the new rules on land mines were originally to be adopted. The next conference is in five years. By then, says U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, mines can be expected to have killed a further 50,000 people and injured 80,000.