VIENTIANE: Laos faces a major challenge in addressing the legacy of wartime bombs, President Choummaly Sayasone told international delegates to a landmark conference that aims to speed the elimination of cluster bombs.
"The Lao PDR is one of the most affected countries in the world by cluster munitions," he said in a speech opening the first meeting of states that are party to the Convention on Cluster Munitions. The pact bans the weapons and became international law on August 1.
"Given (the) large scale of unexploded ordnance contamination, clearance and addressing its impacts on people’s life remain a significant challenge for our national development and poverty reduction," he said, according to a prepared translation of his remarks.
"Against this backdrop, the Lao PDR needs to seek continued support from the international community."
Laos is one of Asia’s poorest nations, an overwhelmingly rural country with about six million people.
The country’s National Regulatory Authority (NRA), which coordinates work on unexploded ordnance (UXOs), says Laos is the most heavily-bombed nation on earth per capita.
Citing United States Air Force data, it said that more than two million tons of ordnance were dropped on the country between 1964 and 1973, when the US war in neighboring Vietnam spilled into Laos.
Among the weapons were 270 million cluster bomblets, which had an average failure rate of 30 percent, the NRA said.
These and other leftover bombs contaminate up to 25 percent of the country’s villages, kill or injure somebody almost every day, and create insecurity that hinders economic development, the NRA said in a report.
Asked earlier how much money Laos would need to clear the leftover explosives, a government spokesman said, "No one can estimate that."
More than 1,000 government and military officials, charity workers and bomb victims, some of whom arrived in wheelchairs, have gathered for the four-day meeting, a major event for the landlocked communist nation which has never hosted a global conference before.
Hundreds of school children waving flowers lined the road to the theatre where the event opened. Dozens of other youngsters, in traditional dress of the country’s numerous ethnic groups, sang and danced.
Cluster bombs, launched from the ground or dropped from the air, split open before impact to scatter multiple bomblets over a wide area.
The bomblets can resemble a large flashlight battery or a tennis ball. Many fail to explode and can lie hidden for decades, posing a threat to unsuspecting farmers and children.
Norway was the first country to sign the convention, followed by Laos.
Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon also have high numbers of casualties from leftover cluster munitions, said the Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor, a non-governmental monitoring project.
After Laos and Vietnam, Iraq and Cambodia have the largest areas of contaminated land. They are among at least 23 states and three other areas believed to have cluster bomb remnants, it said.
The Cluster Munitions Convention entitles parties to financial and other assistance to clean up the explosives within 10 years.
It prohibits all use, stockpiling, production and transfer of the weapons, and requires that victims be assisted.
A total of 108 nations have signed the convention and more than 40 have ratified it, which makes them full parties.
The Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor said 74 countries still have stockpiles of cluster bombs but about 20 have already destroyed or are eliminating them.
