Phantom menace

Three hundred bombs were accidentally triggered in Georgia between 2001 and April 2004, the Georgian committee of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) told News Georgia agency. The victims include 54 children and 21 women.

The Georgian committee's database is currently the only source of information about people who have suffered because of landmine explosions in Georgia, since the country has no official statistics in this area.

Most cases of mines triggered occurred in 2001 (111); it was 97 in 2002, 50 in 2003, and 42 in 2004.

The committee says Georgia has not yet joined the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty in spite that it spoke in favour of this at the UN General Assembly that discussed the document. The government explains failure to sign the Treaty with that the central government has no jurisdiction over the conflict areas in Abkhazia and South Ossetia as yet, and that there are certain difficulties with neutralising the munitions former Soviet troops have left in the country.

A large number of mines located in the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict area, in a territory near the river Inguri where Abkhazia's administrative border lies, represent significant danger for the population, according to the committee. Mines are also laid along the borders and in the territories of the Russian military bases.

There are currently 54 mine-clearance experts in Georgia who were trained in the US in 2001-02, the committee says. The US allocated Georgia $1.5 million for mine clearance in 2004. The Netherlands allocated Georgia $300,000 and Canada $69,000 for the same purpose in 2003.

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