CAIRO: Two landmines south of the resort town of Dahab exploded, killing three Egyptians and severely wounding two others, amid warnings from local and international human rights groups concerning Egypt’s landmine problem and their constant calls for immediate aid to end it.
Egypt was declared by Landmine Monitor (LM) in late 2005 as “one of the most mine-infested countries in the world. The country has been reported to have approximately 20 million landmines and unexploded ordnances (UXOs) on its territory. The presence of landmines hinders significant agricultural and construction projects, making it difficult to establish industrial cities in many areas with strategic significance.
Government reports, however, claim the number has been reduced to 16 million in the past few years.
In the latest incident in the Sinai Peninsula Monday, two police officers were among the dead, while two soldiers were wounded and instantly transferred to the nearby resort Sharm El-Sheikh for treatment.
According to an Associated Press report, police said one of the mines went off as a bulldozer was trying to dig a tunnel to lay a gas pipeline. The driver of the bulldozer, Ibrahim Khadir Al-Sabky, was killed instantly according to the report. Initial reports said that the second explosion happened during the clearing of an area believed to have been infested with mines during the 1967 war with Israel. However, a thorough investigation into the incident has not yet been launched.
A few months before the incident, the National Council for Human Rights (NCHR) and government ministry officials held an urgent conference to discuss ways to make Egypt a “mine-free country, calling on local authorities to address the problems and help campaign for international aid.
According to the LM 2005 report on Egypt, Egypt has been reluctant to comply with the Mine Ban Treaty, a widely publicized international accord that prohibits any country from having antipersonnel mines on its land or even removing the killer landmines, adding that the country rarely assists in mine clearance.
According to the same report, Egypt has also refrained from voting on a U.N. General Assembly Resolution promoting universal and full implementation of the Mine Ban Treaty. The deputy foreign minister was quoted as saying that mines were particularly important to Egypt because of the country’s “expansive borders that would otherwise be difficult to protect, and would render them susceptible to terrorist infiltration, arms and explosive smuggling, banditry and drug trafficking.
Egypt’s reluctance to remove landmines or to undergo humanitarian mine clearance could lead to more serious damages, injuries and possibly deaths. As reported by LM, World War II-era landmines and UXO could easily affect “an estimated 500,000 civilians in the western desert . as a result of the Egypt-Israel wars, mines and UXO [could] affect some 300,000 civilians in the eastern areas. The report added that “very few mined areas are marked or mapped, and [that] Egyptian civilians continue to use the mine-affected areas for cultivation, grazing, infrastructure projects and housing.
The United Nations has also annually published reports, including warnings and recommendations, about what they have called “the adverse impact of Egypt’s mine problem on the humanitarian, economic and industrial environment in Egypt, especially in areas like the Western Sahara.
In response, Egyptian authorities called on international communities for aid and monetary funds, officials saying that countries that infested the lands during the war should have a role in clearing them and a duty toward this “national crisis. In the latest Cairo-based conference, Minister of Foreign Affairs Ahmad Abul-Gheit declared that the mine problem has gone beyond the realm of being a national issue and that the international community is bound to help.
