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Iraqis Comb Northern Hills for Unexploded Mines April 12, 2004 GRDASOOR, Iraq (Reuters) - From a small operations tent nestled in the hills behind the tiny hamlet of Grdasoor, Fakir Hamed looks out over a landscape typical of Iraq's northern Kurdish countryside in almost every way. Across the verdant slopes, scores of men in blue protective suits and blast visors are kneeling down or slowly combing their way through the land looking for live anti-personnel mines hidden beneath the soil. "The people that left these weapons were cowards," said Hamed, a team supervisor with the Kurdish de-mining organization, Aras. "This wasn't even the frontline for the army back then, they put (the mines) here for the civilians." The "Bani-Rey-Grdasoor" or "road above the red hill" minefield was laid by the Iraqi army from 1974 to 1984 as protection for three small military outposts. It lies between Kirkuk and Arbil, close to Iraq's border with the Kurdish autonomous zone that was created in 1991. Hamed and his team do not keep count of the number of weapons they destroy, but since February 18 they have managed to clear around a third of the 1.3 million square feet area. "We don't think about the scale of the problem," Hamed said. "If we destroy one mine that means we're saving a life or a limb, protecting our people and our country." The conversation pauses for a moment as an explosion echoes across the hillside. A quick radio check confirms one of the specialized tractors used to cut grass before de-miners move in has just run over a mine, but the driver is unhurt. RISKY WORK De-mining organizations clear land around known former military zones and also identify new land mines by talking to locals after a land mine accident occurs. The first stage is to clear the area of excess vegetation using "de-mining machines," heavy agricultural-type vehicles with reinforced cabins, developed and constructed in Kurdistan. Teams then use metal detectors to locate individual mines, and finally explode them at the end of the day. The process is dangerous. In March, two Aras de-miners were killed and seven wounded when a tripwire on an Italian-made V69 anti-personnel mine was inadvertently activated. "A small mistake can lead to a big accident," said one of Hamed's colleagues, his blood type written an identity badge around his neck. The team said it had found Russian, Italian, Iraqi, Iranian and even Israeli-made land mines, but that the most dangerous were the U.S.-made M14s because of their low metal content, making them harder to detect. Foreign nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have been working in Kurdish territories since 1991. On March 23, the MAG de-mining organization said more than a million mines and unexploded ordnance had been removed. The task of mine clearance is now shifting south toward the zone just below the Iraq-Kurdistan border, or green line, and de-mining officials and medical sources expect casualty rates to rise once more. "Up until 21 November last year, NGOs were not allowed to go south of the green line," said Dlear Yaqoub, a senior official with the Regional Mine Action Center in Arbil, which took over from a United Nations program overseeing de-mining operations. "They'd been in the autonomous zone for years so it was clear what the problem was and where the mines were, but south of the green line is unknown so far." Yacoub said more urgent than actually destroying the ordnance was to identify and demarcate mined areas since 85 percent of the area was agricultural grazing land. "The Iraqi government mined all along the green line up until maybe two months before the (recent) war," he said. "You can see the empty boxes, and some mines were laid with the safety pins still inside." PROBLEM INCREASING The hospitals work in tandem with the de-mining organizations, providing data for statistical records. Ziad Kakamin, field supervisor at the Arbil hospital said the war had aggravated the problem, with Saddam's forces hurriedly planting mines in the run up to the conflict. "The problem used to be huge but then it decreased," he said. "Now it's getting worse again because of the recent war, especially along the green line." In 2003, the Arbil hospital treated 64 victims of land mine or unexploded ordnance accidents, compared to 31 in 2002. Last month there were eight. Children between 10 and 20 account for 70 percent of those hurt. Nine-year-old Jagar Ramazan lay dazed in the hospital's intensive care ward after an accident near the green line. Both his legs had to be amputated above the knee. He also lost two fingers and a thumb. "I'm a shepherd," he said. "I don't know what happened but I knew it was dangerous. © Copyright Reuters 2004. |
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