According to the report of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, at present, hundreds of millions of mines and unexploded ordnance are mainly distributed in about 79 countries and 8 regions around the world. The hardest hit areas are concentrated in war-torn areas in Africa and Asia, and there are also a certain number of countries in the Balkans and South America in Europe. Basically, mines are buried wherever there is war.
In the past two decades, due to years of wars and tribal conflicts, the African continent, especially poor sub-Saharan Africa, has become the most mined area. Because most countries in these areas are weak in economic strength and unable to buy a large number of high-tech advanced weapons, cheap mines have become the cheapest means of defense for these armed forces. After the war, these tens of millions of mines left in various places were not cleared in time due to economic and technical problems, which became the biggest problem facing the reconstruction of these countries.
The Middle East, which has never been peaceful, is also one of the most mined areas. Due to many large-scale wars and years of hostility between Arab countries and Israel, as well as the Gulf War and the Iraq War, tens of millions of mines remain in Arab countries. Iraq left a large number of mines, roadside bombs and unexploded bombs because of the two wars, and also killed Coalition forces in Iraq, and Iraqis complained even more. In the Middle East, Egypt has left the largest number of mines. According to United Nations estimates, there are still more than 20 million explosive devices buried in Egypt, accounting for about 1/5 of the world total. According to the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram, about 8,000 Egyptian civilians were killed and injured by mines in the past 20 years. The mines left by Egypt can even be traced back to World War II, when Egypt was the main battlefield of the North African campaign, and the German "African Legion" launched a large-scale battle with the British army, leaving tens of millions of mines. In addition, in the third and fourth Middle East wars, the Egyptian army and the Israeli army fought fiercely in the Sinai Peninsula, where a large number of mines were also buried.
Years of anti-Soviet war, civil war in Afghanistan and the war in Afghanistan launched by the United States have led to the laying of tens of millions of mines in Afghanistan 1300 square kilometers. According to Kabul's Reform newspaper, although there are 65,438+06 non-governmental demining institutions in Afghanistan, there are still many areas of the country with mines. It was also because of the invasion that Cambodia laid nearly 3 million mines. Half of these mines come from the former Soviet army, and most of them have no self-destruction function and have been left over to this day. Colombia has laid more than 10 million mines all over the country because of the conflict between government forces and anti-government forces for nearly 40 years. In addition to the above areas, tens of millions of mines are buried in some countries in South Asia, the Balkans and South America.
From the distribution of mines in the world, we can see a phenomenon. Apart from war factors, most mines buried after World War II are distributed in poor areas. Because of poverty, they chose this cheap weapon. Similarly, due to poverty, these countries were unable to organize demining after the war.
The legacy of landmines is endless.
Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan stressed the seriousness of the landmine problem: "The existence of landmines is enough to threaten all mankind."
Annan's words are no exaggeration. Landmines do pose a great threat to all countries, especially to the personal safety of their people. In recent years, the number of mine casualties has been relatively stable, but since June 5438 +2005 10, mine injuries have occurred in 58 countries and 7 regions. According to the mine monitoring report in 2006, in 2006, there were110 mine accidents in Colombia, 875 mine accidents in Cambodia and 363 people were injured in Iraq and Palestine. In Afghanistan, mines kill more than 65,438,000 people on average every month. According to the estimation of Afghan authorities, in the past 20 years, the number of casualties caused by mines in Afghanistan was close to 654.38+500,000. In Cambodia, you may accidentally step on a mine buried under the floor when shopping in a shopping mall. In parks in the former Yugoslavia, even on asphalt roads, people are often killed by lightning while exercising.
Apart from injuring people, mines also have a great impact on the production and post-war reconstruction of some countries, and even become the source of poverty. According to Afghan newspapers, in some areas of Afghanistan, 45% of cultivated land has been abandoned because of mines, and farmers have no land to plant and no economic source, which has seriously affected the reconstruction work in Afghanistan.
Mine clearance is far more difficult than mine laying.
Landmines are the most difficult traces of war to clear, and it is far more difficult to clear mines than to mine them.
Technically speaking, mine detection is the first step in mine clearance. At present, the widely used mine detector is metal mine detector, but it can only detect mines containing metal, but it can't do anything about all-plastic mines. In this regard, scientists and technicians are constantly developing new mine detection equipment. For example, according to the different thermal signal characteristics of mines and soil, naked mines can be found by infrared thermal imager, and radar detectors can be seen through the ground. Some countries even use the keen sense of smell of dogs and mice to detect mines. Some time ago, American researchers developed an acoustic sensing device, which can find and locate mines buried far away through acoustic vibration.
Once the location of the mine is determined, it is only a matter of time before it is cleared. The most common method of mine clearance is manual mine clearance, which relies on the personal experience and technology of professional mine clearance personnel to remove mines and make them ineffective. However, this method is slow and poses a great threat to deminers. Therefore, people have developed the methods of blasting demining and mechanical demining, that is, detonating mines by different means. But in any case, demining is a time-consuming and laborious high-risk job. Although mine clearance is not easy, mine laying efficiency is high and modern mine laying technology is mature. For example, the scorpion mine-laying vehicle developed by Germany in 1980s can load 600 anti-tank mines at a time, and lay 1 anti-tank minefield with width150m and depth of 60m within 5 minutes.
In addition to technical factors, mine clearance also requires a lot of capital investment. In recent years, the world's official funds for mine clearance are hundreds of millions of dollars every year, and the international campaign to ban landmines has also launched a donation activity with private capital to help mine clearance. However, experts estimate that it will take 600 years to clear mines in Afghanistan at the current rate. Eliminating world mine disasters has a long way to go. (Global Times)