wfn.org | FEATURE: African Inter-Faith Initiative Promotes Landmine

["Frank Imhoff" <Frank.Imhoff@elca.org>]

FEATURE: African Inter-Faith Initiative Promotes Landmine Survivors'
Exchange Program 
Call for Concerted Effort in Reducing Risks, Enhancing Rehabilitation
for Mine Victims

KAMPALA, Uganda/GENEVA, 11 May 2005 (LWI) - "When I woke up the next
day, I was disabled." That is how Margaret Arach Orech, an active member
of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) summarized her
encounter with the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) insurgency in northern
Uganda in 1998. 

She had had been caught up in an ambush when leaving Kitgum town. At
first, she mistook the explosion for a tire burst. "But I did not
realize that I had lost a leg," Orech, currently co-chairperson of the
ICBL Working Group on Victim Assistance (WGVA) told participants in a
landmine survivors exchange program in the Ugandan capital, Kampala,
March 29-April 2. 

"I had bled for nine hours before we reached the hospital," Orech said,
repeating a story she has narrated in several forums. Sharing this
experience, telling of the trauma, pain and suffering that survivors
undergo has helped in her own and others' healing process. 
Participants in the program were drawn from a spectrum of
non-governmental organizations and civil society movements that support
a total ban on landmines, estimated somewhere between 60-85 million in
the ground in over 60 countries worldwide.

Machok Majong, responsible for rehabilitation of disabled persons at
Operation Save Innocent Lives (OSIL) in Southern Sudan was injured
during fighting between the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army
(SPLM/A) and government soldiers. He described his involvement in OSIL
thus: "We have been telling them that disability is not inability. They
are still useful in the community."

Majong said there were many disabled persons in Southern Sudan, who
have fallen victim to the numerous undiscovered fields of the so-called
unexploded ordinances (UXOs). The UXO victims, he said, are now roaming
helplessly around towns mentally frustrated and traumatized, with no
care or assistance at all.

"The [Sudanese] government does not give them any support. The SPLM/A
cannot afford any assistance," he said, adding that 90 percent of any
available help comes from local communities.

"Or they can go to the refugees camps where the international community
may offer assistance," said Majong, who was rescued by a good Samaritan
and taken to a hospital in Lokichoggio, northwestern Kenya where he had
his arm amputated.

The Kampala landmine survivors exchange visit was organized by the
Inter-Faith Action for Peace in Africa (IFAPA), an initiative of the
Geneva-based Lutheran World Federation, and attended by delegates from
Ethiopia, Kenya, Southern Sudan and Uganda. Since its establishment in
October 2002, IFAPA continues to strategically engage leaders of faith
communities in initiatives that prevent conflict, encourage
reconciliation and nurture peace in different parts of Africa. The
landmine survivors program is considered a major contribution to
long-term peace building processes.

Mereso Agina, coordinator of the Kenya Coalition Against Landmines said
traditional donors were shunning funding victim assistance programs on
the assumption that these were domestic initiatives which did not fall
within their scope. Such support also tended to be comparatively less
for Africa compared to other regions. She noted that Afghanistan for
example, received three times the combined assistance toward Angola and
Mozambique in 2004.

Bekele Gonfa, Landmine Survivors Network in Ethiopia, told the meeting
"there is no question, persons with disabilities were entitled to the
full range of human rights guaranteed to all people under the 1948
United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights."

But he argued that this instrument did not adequately address
disabilities' specific social, political, economic and cultural
circumstances, although its provisions held tremendous potential to
equipping the estimated 300,000-400,000 landmine survivors to claim
their human rights. The number of landmine casualties, according to the
ICBL's Landmine Monitor Report 2004 increased by 15,000 or 20,000 each
year, with an estimated 500 innocent civilians killed or wounded each
week.

Landmines are dreaded for their ability to lay dormant underground for
decades until they are activated. In situations of conflict, warring
groups have been planting them to force civilians abandon their land.
Those who survive the initial blast almost always suffer horrific
injuries and limb amputations, and are often disabled for life.

Addressing the IFAPA exchange program, Uganda's Minister of State for
Disaster Preparedness and Refugees, Christine Aporu Amongin, described
the global landmine crisis as the most pervasive problem facing the
world.

"Civil conflicts and wars have increased the number of landmines in
[Africa], both in stocks and in the fields," she said in her official
opening address.

Her government has been engaged in a nearly two-decade struggle against
the LRA rebels in the northern districts of Gulu, Kitgum and Pader,
where hundreds of thousands of people have been killed, maimed, injured
and displaced by insurgency activities including landmines.

"As a government, we must work together with religious groups, NGOs and
community-based groups in reducing mine risks and rehabilitation of
those disabled by landmines," she told the gathering.

If the obstacle to saving a victim's life is not the long distance to
the nearest health facility, it is lack resources at the health centers.
For example, in Kassala, Southern Sudan, 84 percent of reported landmine
or UXO casualties had to be transported at least 50 kilometers to the
nearest health facility. In Ethiopia, only seven percent of the
survivors identified between 2001 and 2003 were reported to have
received rehabilitation assistance. 

Moreover, most heavily mined countries are also the most
underdeveloped, lacking requisite facilities and basic infrastructure
such as roads, effective telecommunications network and health
facilities.

In her presentation, Agina charged that the mine action networks had to
argue a strong case for respective states and donors to elevate mine
victim assistance to the highest possible priority in their resource
allocation planning. 

Sheikh Hamid Byamugenzi, Uganda Muslim Supreme Council, spoke on the
role of faith communities in lobbying and advocating for the rights of
people with disability. He said such involvement included an inter-faith
perspective that sought to understand the issues 'within' a given
religion itself. "Does that faith show compassion and respect for
members of its congregations who are disabled?" he asked. 

An intra-faith approach was equally important, according to Byamugenzi.
It included cooperation with other faiths in working toward securing the
rights of people with disability and addressing broader peace issues in
the community. 

In a number of resolutions, the anti-landmine campaigners stressed the
religious leaders' important role in working toward reconciliation and
peace in communities torn by conflict. They also vowed to continue
lobbying governments on their commitment to the Mine Ban Treaty on
victim assistance. (1,091 words)

(By Nairobi (Kenya)-based LWI correspondent Fredrick Nzwili.)

*Sidebar: According to the Landmine Monitor Report 2004, funding for
mine action has significantly increased since 1999, but assistance
toward mine victims has declined. The report notes that due to efforts
by the ICBL, signatory state parties, international and local NGOs in
the field, the Mine Ban Treaty (calling for a total ban on the use,
production, transfer and stockpiling of antipersonnel landmines) has had
an impact in raising awareness about the rights and needs of mine
survivors, and has enabled the survivors themselves to advocate for
services that would address their needs. While new programs have been
implemented in many mine-affected countries, significant gaps remain in
areas such as geographic coverage, affordability, and quality of
available facilities. 

The ICBL welcomed as "concrete and forward-looking" the declaration and
action plan of the Nairobi Summit on a Mine-Free World in
November/December 2004, which agreed on a wide range of measures to
combat antipersonnel mines over the next five years. The anti-landmine
body said it would sustain the pressure until the world has spurned
antipersonnel mines and fully implemented the Mine Ban Treaty. 

At least 22 mine-affected states are now taking, or have taken, steps
to develop a plan of action to address the needs of mine survivors, or
improve services for all persons with disabilities. Some donor states
are also acknowledging their responsibilities to provide resources to
assist mine-affected states in fulfilling their obligations. 

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tradition. Founded in 1947 in Lund, Sweden, the LWF currently has 138
member churches in 77 countries all over the world, with a membership of
nearly 66 million Christians. The LWF acts on behalf of its member
churches in areas of common interest such as ecumenical and inter-faith
relations, theology, humanitarian assistance, human rights,
communication, and the various aspects of mission and development work.
Its secretariat is located in Geneva, Switzerland.)

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