Unexploded ordnance in Afghanistan poses hidden threat
Dozens of Soviet tanks were left to rust
in place more than two decades ago, one of many explosive hazards in
Afghanistan. (Paul Giblin, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers / July 28,
2012)
|
The hulking old tanks, left to rust when Soviet forces pulled out of Afghanistan in 1989, still packed a threat when
Albert Whittington arrived.
Whittington, an ordnance and explosives specialist with the Baltimore district of the Army Corps of Engineers, clambered through dozens of Red Army tanks, trench-digging vehicles, bridge-laying equipment and other derelict machinery at the Pul-e-Charki military base east of Kabul. Many unexploded ordnance, unused ammunition and other materials still capable of maiming or killing Whittington, 39, has spent the past year working to make Afghanistan safer from one of the deadly legacies of war.
More than three decades of conflict in Afghanistan — from the Soviet invasion of 1979 through the civil war of the 1990s to the U.S.-led invasion after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 — have left the impoverished farming country one of the most heavily mined in the world.
"Basically, Afghanistan has been contaminated with unexploded ordnance by the full range of actors," said Elena Rice, a program officer with the United Nations Mine Action Service.
Whittington, an Army veteran who lives in La Plata in Southern Maryland, has seen material in Afghanistan from "most of the major countries" — Britain, Russia, China, the United States — and many smaller nations.
They have left the country with 6,000 known hazardous areas, danger zones that disrupt farming, housing, resettlement and development in 1,900 communities across Afghanistan, according to the U.N. agency.
Speaking by telephone from the capital, Kabul, Whittington described a typical explosion.
"Kids, they'll be out playing ball and they'll come across something neat and shiny," he said. "They go over to play with it, and the next thing you know, they drop it and it goes boom — and you have children that are injured, or worse."
The United States, which began working in the 1990s to clear Afghanistan of the explosive remnants of war, is the largest donor in the international effort to eliminate the threat within a decade.
The U.S., the United Nations and others have paid to train 14,000 Afghans to identify, safely handle and dispose of unexploded ordnance, Rice says. If there is continued funding, she says, the work is on schedule for completion in 10 years.
For now, the weapons continue to kill. An average of 33 people per month were injured or killed in Afghanistan last year by such munitions. More than half the victims were boys ages 7 to 14.
Afghans gather and sell munitions for scrap. Rice describes villagers using rocket shells in their homes, for roofing or as part of their stoves.
"Afghans have been living with land mines and unexploded bombs for 20, 30 years," she said. "They tend to know what the story is. A lot of accidents are driven by, 'OK, we know there's a risk, but we're also going to die of poverty, of starvation.' "
Firoz Ali Alizada called it "a devastating scenario, despite two decades of work to remove the threat."
Alizada was walking to his school in the central province of Parwan in 1996 when he stepped on a land mine. He lost both legs. Now 31, he manages the International Campaign to Ban Landmines.
"With every new survivor also comes a new lifelong struggle against discrimination — an ongoing battle in my country," he wrote in an email from Geneva. "The government and international donors must do more to address survivors' needs for medical support, access to services, equality and employment."
Since 1993, the State Department's Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement has provided more than $303 million for de-mining Afghanistan, campaigns to mark hazardous areas and warn of their dangers, and assistance to victims.
For the United States, unexploded ordnance also poses a military risk: Insurgents use old mines and munitions as parts for improvised explosive devices, the roadside bombs that are the leading cause of death among U.S. service members in Afghanistan.
By Matthew Hay Brown, The Baltimore Sun
4:32 p.m. EDT, July 28, 2012
Whittington, an ordnance and explosives specialist with the Baltimore district of the Army Corps of Engineers, clambered through dozens of Red Army tanks, trench-digging vehicles, bridge-laying equipment and other derelict machinery at the Pul-e-Charki military base east of Kabul. Many unexploded ordnance, unused ammunition and other materials still capable of maiming or killing Whittington, 39, has spent the past year working to make Afghanistan safer from one of the deadly legacies of war.
More than three decades of conflict in Afghanistan — from the Soviet invasion of 1979 through the civil war of the 1990s to the U.S.-led invasion after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 — have left the impoverished farming country one of the most heavily mined in the world.
"Basically, Afghanistan has been contaminated with unexploded ordnance by the full range of actors," said Elena Rice, a program officer with the United Nations Mine Action Service.
Whittington, an Army veteran who lives in La Plata in Southern Maryland, has seen material in Afghanistan from "most of the major countries" — Britain, Russia, China, the United States — and many smaller nations.
They have left the country with 6,000 known hazardous areas, danger zones that disrupt farming, housing, resettlement and development in 1,900 communities across Afghanistan, according to the U.N. agency.
Speaking by telephone from the capital, Kabul, Whittington described a typical explosion.
"Kids, they'll be out playing ball and they'll come across something neat and shiny," he said. "They go over to play with it, and the next thing you know, they drop it and it goes boom — and you have children that are injured, or worse."
The United States, which began working in the 1990s to clear Afghanistan of the explosive remnants of war, is the largest donor in the international effort to eliminate the threat within a decade.
The U.S., the United Nations and others have paid to train 14,000 Afghans to identify, safely handle and dispose of unexploded ordnance, Rice says. If there is continued funding, she says, the work is on schedule for completion in 10 years.
For now, the weapons continue to kill. An average of 33 people per month were injured or killed in Afghanistan last year by such munitions. More than half the victims were boys ages 7 to 14.
Afghans gather and sell munitions for scrap. Rice describes villagers using rocket shells in their homes, for roofing or as part of their stoves.
"Afghans have been living with land mines and unexploded bombs for 20, 30 years," she said. "They tend to know what the story is. A lot of accidents are driven by, 'OK, we know there's a risk, but we're also going to die of poverty, of starvation.' "
Firoz Ali Alizada called it "a devastating scenario, despite two decades of work to remove the threat."
Alizada was walking to his school in the central province of Parwan in 1996 when he stepped on a land mine. He lost both legs. Now 31, he manages the International Campaign to Ban Landmines.
"With every new survivor also comes a new lifelong struggle against discrimination — an ongoing battle in my country," he wrote in an email from Geneva. "The government and international donors must do more to address survivors' needs for medical support, access to services, equality and employment."
Since 1993, the State Department's Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement has provided more than $303 million for de-mining Afghanistan, campaigns to mark hazardous areas and warn of their dangers, and assistance to victims.
For the United States, unexploded ordnance also poses a military risk: Insurgents use old mines and munitions as parts for improvised explosive devices, the roadside bombs that are the leading cause of death among U.S. service members in Afghanistan.
By Matthew Hay Brown, The Baltimore Sun
4:32 p.m. EDT, July 28, 2012
No comments:
Post a Comment
thanks for the comment