Susan Ecky on field visit
Susan Eckey, Deputy Director General for Humanitarian Affairs at the Norwegian Ministry for Foreign Affairs and holder of the Presidency of the State Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty, visited a minefield on the outskirts of Maputo on March 2nd.
The visit coincided with the visit of the Norwegian minister of environment and international development, H.E. Mr. Erik Solheim, who signed a Memorandum of Understanding between the Norwegian Government and the Government of Mozambique for continued support for humanitarian demining in Mozambique on March 1st. The agreement was signed together with Mozambique’s minister for foreign affairs, H.E. Júlio Marques Balói during a ceremony at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Maputo.
18 years after the end of the civil war, the scale and impact of Mozambique’s landmine problem is still high. Despite this, the goal of full clearance of all minefields by 2014 set by the Government of Mozambique is regarded as attainable, provided an acceleration of funding for putting more deminers and mechanical equipment on the ground.
Ms. Eckey visited a demining program run by the HALO Trust which is a UK registered international nongovernmental organization. The HALO Trust operates demining programs in the provinces of Maputo, Manica and Tete in Mozambique. During her visit, Ms. Eckey got the chance to observe clearance of landmines in the local settlement Boquisso in Maputo District. A landmine was destroyed and the thunderous explosion was a reminder of the grave risk that landmines pose for the local population.
During her visit to Mozambique, Ms. Eckey also visited the National institute for Humanitarian Demining which coordinates all mine clearance in Mozambique, and she attended a seminar on humanitarian mine clearance together with Governmental and non-governmental stakeholders in Maputo on March 1st.
The new MOU and the visit of Ms. Eckey received positive attention in Mozambican media.
The Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet was recently in Mozambique and wrote this article (in Norwegian) on the landime situation in the country.