Commitment to the Mine Ban Treaty

Policy

The Republic of Angola signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 4 December 1997 and ratified on 5 July 2002, becoming a State Party on 1 January 2003.

Angola has not formally reported any legal measures to implement the Mine Ban Treaty.[1] Under Article 13 of Angola’s Constitution, any international law approved and ratified by Angola is an integrated part of Angolan law and automatically enters into force at the national level after its publication and entry into force at the international level.[2]

Angola submitted its fifth annual Mine Ban Treaty Article 7 report in October 2010, for the period from January 2009 to July 2010.[3] As of late August 2011, Angola had not yet submitted the annual report due by 30 April 2011, nor did it report on its activities in 2008. 

Angola hosted a National Mine Action Summit in Luanda on 9–10 August 2010. In August 2011, the Third National Meeting on Demining was held in Luanda.

Angola is not party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons.

Production, transfer, use, stockpile destruction, and retention

Angola states that it has never manufactured antipersonnel mines.[4] It is not believed to have exported the weapon in the past. There have not been any confirmed instances of use of antipersonnel mines since Angola ratified the Mine Ban Treaty a decade ago.[5]

Angola completed destruction of its stockpile of antipersonnel mines on 28 December 2006, just ahead of its 1 January 2007 treaty deadline. It destroyed 81,045 mines between October and December 2006, in addition to 7,072 antipersonnel mines apparently destroyed in 2003.[6]

In its last Article 7 report submitted in 2010, Angola reported retaining 2,512 antipersonnel mines for training purposes, the same number that was previously reported in 2007.[7] Angola has not provided an update on mines retained since 2007 or provided details on the intended purposes and actual uses of its retained mines, as agreed by States Parties at review conferences held in 2004 and 2009.

 

Commitment to the Convention on Cluster Munitions

Policy

The Republic of Angola signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008.

In June 2011, the director of the Inter-sectoral Commission on Demining and Humanitarian Assistance (Comissão Nacional Intersectorial de Desminagem e Assistência Humanitária, CNIDAH) said that the domestic process to ratify the convention was continuing on the “right path.”[1] In June 2011, another CNIDAH official informed the Monitor that the ratification process was still at the consultation stage, during which the convention is being reviewed and discussed by relevant ministries and other stakeholders.[2] In November 2010, a government official informed the Monitor that the domestic work necessary for ratification was in progress.[3]

Angola participated extensively in the Oslo Process and, while it did not attend the formal negotiations in Dublin in May 2008, Angola signed the convention in Oslo in December 2008.[4] Angola has continued to actively engage in the work of the convention. It attended the First Meeting of States Parties to the Convention on Cluster Munitions in Vientiane, Lao PDR in November 2010, where it made a statement. Angola attended the convention’s intersessional meeting in Geneva in June 2011, where it made an intervention on victim assistance.

Angola is a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It has not joined the Convention on Conventional Weapons.

Production, transfer, use, and stockpiling

Angola is not believed to have produced or exported cluster munitions.

Cluster munitions have been used in the past in Angola, but it is unclear when or by whom. A CNIDAH official who had seen cluster munitions remnants in Huambo province near Caala and Bailundo, probably from the heavy fighting during 1998–1999, said he believed that the Angolan Armed Forces used cluster munitions because only they used aircraft during this conflict, not the rebel UNITA forces.[5]

The government has not yet provided any details on stockpile destruction or made an official determination and public announcement that all stocks have been identified and destroyed.

In June 2010, a CNIDAH official told the CMC that Angola had destroyed its stockpile of cluster munitions between 2003 and 2010 in a joint initiative of the government and HALO Trust, and that the Armed Forces no longer held any stocks.[6] In addition, HALO’s Weapons and Ammunition Disposal teams, which operate in all 18 provinces destroying police, army, navy, and air force weapons caches, found and destroyed 51 abandoned cluster bomblets in military warehouses.[7] The location of these warehouses has not been reported. As of May 2011, HALO has reported the destruction of 7,267 submunitions (likely from cluster bombs numbering in the hundreds) and 506 submunition dispensers between 2006 and 2011.[8] According to HALO almost all the munitions it has destroyed were in serviceable condition.[9]

In the past, Jane’s Information Group has noted that KMG-U dispensers that deploy submunitions were in service for Angolan aircraft.[10] Deminers operating in Angola have documented the presence of casings of RBK 250/275 cluster bombs among abandoned ammunition.[11] It is likely the KMG-Us and RBKs were of Soviet origin.

Cluster Munition Remnants

The extent to which Angola continues to be affected by unexploded submunitions is unclear. As of March 2011, only HALO had reported finding unexploded submunitions since February 2008.[12] In April 2011, NPA reported that the impact of cluster munition remnants was “very low” in Malanje, Kwanza Sul, Kwanza Norte, Uige, and Zaire.[13] HALO and the National Institute for Demining (INAD) claim that there remain unexploded submunitions in Kuando Kubango.[14]

Prior to 2009 at least two types of cluster munitions had been found in Angola: the Russian-made PTAB-2.5 K0 and the AO-2.5 RT. According to data and completion reports from NGO operators in the national database at CNIDAH in February 2008, Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA) reported clearing 13 unexploded submunitions in the municipality of Ebo in Kwanza Sul province; Mines Advisory Group (MAG) reported clearing 140 unexploded submunitions in Moxico province; and HALO reported clearing 230 unexploded submunitions in Kunhinga municipality in Bié province.[15]

Cluster munition clearance

In 2010, HALO destroyed nine unexploded submunitions and two abandoned cluster bombs containing 84 submunitions in Kuando Kubango during battle area clearance in a 500,000m² area.[16]

Casualties

No casualties from cluster munition remnants were identified in Angola in 2010. However, given that devices are not adequately differentiated, it is possible cluster munition remnants casualties were among those recorded as caused by explosive remnants of war (16) and unknown explosive items (12), which together made up two thirds of all casualties in 2010.[17]

No information was available on the total number of cluster munition casualties. Angola expected to have more information on cluster munition survivors after the completion of the national victim survey.[18] However the survey questionnaire offers just three options as the cause of disability: “a mine,” “an accident,” or “unknown” and has no place to report on cluster submunitions as the cause.[19]

 

Contamination and Impact

Angola is heavily contaminated with mines and explosive remnants of war (ERW), including cluster munition remnants. Contamination is the result of more than four decades of armed conflict, which ended in 2002.

Mines

Estimates of the extent of the mine problem in 1993 spoke of millions of mines littering one-third of the country’s land.[1] It was not until June 2007, following completion of the Landmine Impact Survey (LIS), that a better assessment of contamination in each of the country’s 18 provinces—all of which were contaminated—was achieved.[2]

The LIS identified 3,293 suspected hazardous areas (SHAs) in 1,988 mine/ERW-impacted communities in 383 of Angola’s 557 comunas (districts). These impacted communities represent 8% of the 23,504 communities in the country, affecting an estimated 2.4 million people, or 17% of the population.[3] In March 2009, the national database managed by the National Intersectorial Commission for Demining and Humanitarian Assistance (CNIDAH) showed that 998 SHAs from the LIS—30% of the total—had been canceled by non-technical survey or released through technical survey or clearance, or concerned areas in which clearance was ongoing.[4]

In December 2010, CNIDAH reported 629 SHAs covering 267km² had been cleared or cancelled and another 2,515 SHAs covering an estimated 923km² still needed to be surveyed.[5] The database was further updated in January 2011 when CNIDAH and the Survey Action Center (SAC) convened a workshop in Washington, DC, and concluded there 2,242 SHAs remained, impacting on 1,400 communities, though an associated estimate of contaminated area was not provided.[6]CNIDAH expects that clearance and other forms of land release as well as the results of an ongoing national survey, LIS II,[7] will further reduce the extent of the problem. This new estimate will be the basis of Angola’s Article 5 deadline extension request.[8]

Humanitarian demining priorities are being addressed only by international and national NGOs. However, a decline in donor funding has affected NGOs engaged in mine action and led to a significant reduction in the number and scale of NGO demining operators in recent years.[9] For example, since 2008 HALO Trust has had to reduce its personnel from 1,100 to 800 due to funding shortages and Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA) similarly has fewer personnel and is able to cover fewer provinces with its program.[10]

Cluster munition remnants

The extent to which Angola continues to be affected by unexploded submunitions is unclear. As of March 2011, only HALO had reported finding unexploded submunitions since February 2008.[11] In April 2011, NPA reported that the impact of cluster munition remnants was “very low” in Kwanza Sul, Kwanza Norte, Malanje, Uige, and Zaire.[12] HALO and the National Institute for Demining (INAD) claim, however, that unexploded submunitions remain to be cleared in Kuando Kubango.[13]

At least two types of cluster munitions have been found in Angola: the Russian-made PTAB-2.5 K0 and the AO-2.5 RT. According to data and completion reports from NGO operators in the national database at CNIDAH as of February 2008, NPA had reported clearing 13 unexploded submunitions in the municipality of Ebo in Kwanza Sul province; Mines Advisory Group (MAG) had reported clearing 140 unexploded submunitions in Moxico province; and HALO reported clearing 230 unexploded submunitions in Kunhinga municipality in Bié province.[14]

Other explosive remnants of war

Angola is significantly contaminated with ERW across all 18 provinces. Demining operators expend considerable assets on explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) tasks.[15] INAD reported finding 31,000 ERW during 62 tasks while NGOs reported finding 2,731 items of unexploded ordnance (UXO) during EOD tasks in seven provinces. MAG reported that most ERW contamination in Moxico is around old military installations and on main routes as well as being scattered throughout the province.[16]NPA reports their EOD teams find ERW on a daily basis.[17]

Mine Action Program

Key institutions and operators

CNIDAH serves as the national mine action authority. It is responsible for accrediting NGOs and commercial demining companies and, in principle, these companies send their clearance reports to CNIDAH.[18] CNIDAH’s 18 provincial operations offices (one in each province) determine annual priorities based on demining NGO priority tasks, the LIS, provincial plans, and requests from traditional leaders and other NGOs.[19]CNIDAH’s priorities for 2011 were demining and better management of the mine action database. The annual operating budget for CNIDAH is approximately US$15 million.[20]

In 2010, CNIDAH began developing National Mine Action Standards based on the International Mine Action Standards. In 2011, the priority was to finalize standards for non-technical and technical survey for LIS II and land release. CNIDAH is also revising its accreditation procedures. The new accreditation process will have two phases, one for organizational capacity in terms of staff and equipment, and the other for operations.[21]

In 2005, the government established the Executive Commission for Demining (Comissão Executiva de Desminagem, CED), which is chaired by the Minister of Social Assistance and Reintegration, to manage the demining operations of the Angolan Armed Forces (Forças Armadas Angolanas, FAA), the National Reconstruction Office (Gabinete de Reconstrução Nacional, GRN), and INAD. INAD is a public institute responsible for conducting demining operations under the Ministry of Social Assistance and Reintegration.[22]It is the largest demining operator in Angola.

In 2010, Japan extended its support to INAD, through UNDP, to build INAD’s capacity as the main national demining operator. The project, initially planned for three years (2007–2009), was extended, based on a request from INAD to continue the UNDP advisory support, until the end of 2011. Support was also received from Japan. The objective of this three-year project was to build INAD’s capacity to support the Government of Angola’s national development plans with an emphasis on transportation, (roads and bridges), communications (fiber optics and mobile communication towers), and energy (power plants).[23] Under the project, in 2010 INAD established a training site for mechanical demining in Cunene, a province bordering Namibia. UNDP supports five national advisors who work with INAD offices in 15 provinces on mechanical support.[24]

UNDP also hired an international consultant in 2010, to identify ways for INAD to improve its vehicle maintenance capacity and to determine the extent to which INAD requires training and assistance in ensuring reliable transport to their demining teams. The consultant found INAD lacked enough vehicles to support its field operations as well as a lack of skills in mechanical demining among the brigades. They recommended INAD make a major investment in workshop facilities and ongoing skills training if they planned to continue to lead Angola’s mine action program in meeting its development goals over the next five years.[25]

At the end of 2010, UNDP began transitioning support to INAD, in preparation for the reduction of the number of its international and national advisors. Since January 2011, UNDP has not employed any international technical advisors. UNDP’s role in mine action in Angola after 2011 is unclear.[26]

The European Commission (EC) is one of the largest donors in Angola. In 2010, the EC awarded contracts over a three-year period for €20 million ($26.5 million[27]), of which €16 million ($21.2 million) was for demining and the remaining €4 million ($5.3 million) was for technical assistance to CNIDAH and INAD.[28]Included in the €20 million grant was a three-year €3 million ($3.9 million) contract awarded to the French company Civipol Conseil[29] for a capacity-building project with CNIDAH and INAD, a focus covered previously with UNDP support. A consortium led by Civipol Conseil, which has no previous mine action experience, includes Cesoci (Portugal) Geomine (France), MAT Mondial, (United Kingdom)[30] and the Swiss Foundation for Mine Action (France). The Consortium planned to conduct a needs assessment before establishing the project’s goals.[31]

Mine action information management

The lack of a functioning national mine action database is one of the most protracted problems in the mine action program in Angola. Despite years of international technical assistance, huge quantities of data from surveys, trained data entry personnel, the provision of computer equipment, and the establishment of provincial CNIDAH offices to facilitate data management, Angola has frequently been unable to accurately report its annual achievements or to state its remaining problem in quantifiable terms such as the number of SHAs, the number of impacted communities, or the estimated size of the contaminated area. Balbina da Silva, CNIDAH’s coordinator, told the Monitor in April 2010 that Angola would not submit an Mine Ban Treaty Article 7 report until the database problems were sorted out.[32]

In an initial step to address the problems with the database HALO, DCA, INAD, MAG, MgM, and NPA provided a list of all tasks completed in conjunction with planning for a mine action “summit” held in Luanda in August 2010. The NGOs had submitted lists that totaled 2,000 tasks but only around 1,000 were recorded in the database and the NGOs reported that they had canceled nearly as many SHAs as they had cleared. In November 2010, CNIDAH convened a meeting with the NGOs to review the data and seek solutions on data management.[33]

Through a comparison of NGO records and the database it became apparent that the operator-reported status of the task matched the status recorded by CNIDAH in only about half of all cases. Further research found that errors at the data entry level were a major source of the problem including omitting a necessary “link” from the conclusion report that left some records in the database “active” when in fact some tasks recorded as “active” had been completed. Other problems included errors in SHA locator codes submitted by operators and SHAs identified during the LIS as affecting more than one community, but for which only one was selected for the database. It appears a different code may have been used for reporting by the operator and the division of large SHAs into smaller sections for operational purposes was never properly documented.[34]

In January 2011, the CNIDAH Database Unit and SAC convened a workshop in Washington, DC, to work further on the database over a two-week period. At the end of the workshop it had identified 1,056 SHAs associated with 588 impacted communities from the LIS that should be considered cleared or canceled. This represents one-third of the total originally identified in the LIS. Based on this database clean-up, 1,400 impacted communities and 2,242 SHAs remain from the LIS.[35]

Results of CNIDAH database clean-up

SAC recommended that CNIDAH review all manual data entry against records received, and conduct bi-weekly testing for known errors. It also suggested that CNIDAH provide monthly reports to operators to ensure that data entered on the national database is correct, make the database public and available to all, and provide both an electronic and paper trail of data received from NGOs at provincial level to CNIDAH in Luanda.

Evaluations of the mine action program

Angola is the only large mine action program in the world that has not been evaluated since its inception.

Land Release

A major development in land release is the clean-up of the CNIDAH-managed mine action database and the reduction in the number of SHAs. HALO, MAG, and NPA are largely responsible for this reduction. These three NGOs combined have visited 1,102 SHAs from the LIS since 2006, approximately one-third of the total and canceled 408 while clearing 316.[36] CNIDAH reports 629 SHAs have been cleared or cancelled covering an estimated 268km².[37]

In 2010, four international demining operators cleared 4km² of mined area. The amount of battle area clearance (BAC) conducted in 2010 remained low as there are very few areas remaining that require major BAC.[38]

SHAs from the LIS released as of 1 January 2011[39]

Survey in 2010

Survey and re-survey is common practice among the NGO operators in Angola. NGOs regularly identify previously unknown mined areas from survey and community liaison. These areas are found largely because people move into previously uninhabited and unused areas where there had been no information or indication that a threat from mines existed. This migration of people includes newly returned refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zambia, as well as people who had moved from the overcrowded cities to the rural areas. Additionally, communities are expanding, resulting in new land being used.[40]

In 2009, for example, the NGOs identified 107 new SHAs covering 4.08km² in eight provinces while in 2010 HALO, MAG, and NPA identified 61 SHAs in seven provinces covering a total of 4.84km².

In 2010, two NPA combined survey/EOD teams surveyed Malanje, Kwanza Sul, and Kwanza Norte, revisiting 168 SHAs covering 51.05km². Of these 91 (32.46km²) were canceled while another 77 areas, previously estimated as covering 18.59km², were reduced by 3km², resulting in a new estimation of contamination of 15.53km².[41]

HALO focused on refining the information on the remaining mined areas and canceling areas originally reported to have been mined where the local population has already started using the land and where HALO found no evidence of mines. HALO also began a “Mine Free District” process in Huambo province, a process HALO used in Mozambique. Based on the “Mine Free District” process, HALO plans to declare Huambo province clear of known mined areas in the next few years. Since 2006 HALO has released through clearance and cancellation 374 SHAs from the LIS.[42]In 2010, HALO identified 29 new SHAs covering 1.66km² in Benguela, Bié, Huambo and Kuando Kubango provinces.[43]

In Moxico province MAG identified seven new SHAs covering 344,618m². Since 2006 MAG has re-surveyed 140 SHAs and cancelled 68 SHAs and cleared 20, reducing the contaminated area by 13km².[44]

DCA, INAD, and MgM did not report survey activities for 2010.

LIS II

The follow up to the LIS is the “Levantamento e actualização dos dados de areas suspeitas de contaminação com minas terrestres” (“Survey and update of data concerning suspected hazardous areas”), commonly referred to as LIS II. The international NGO operators with an EC contract awarded in 2010, with the exception of HALO, will conduct LIS II in the six provinces they currently operate: Moxico (DCA, MAG), Kuando Kubango (MgM), and Kwanza Norte, and Malanje (NPA).[45]

HALO will not participate in the LIS II as part of its EC contract because in the original LIS HALO carried out a full non-technical “polygon” survey on all the SHAs it identified.[46] The findings from HALO’s polygon surveys in the LIS are said to be well documented. The UN Mine Action Service quality assurance (QA) monitor for the LIS wrote: “HALO’s decision to apply additional effort in determining the size of SHAs has provided these four provinces (Benguela, Huambo, Bié, and Kuando Kubango) with very accurate data with which to plan and conduct clearance and follow-on activities. The accuracy of the SHA sizes is demonstrated by the relatively small SHAs in the HALO provinces—an average of 46,000m²…compared to 433,000m²…across the country as a whole.”[47] According to HALO, CNIDAH and the EC have acknowledged that it would not be necessary for HALO to re-survey in the four provinces.  Instead, HALO will continue its regular resurvey of all confirmed hazardous areas (CHAs) to update information prior to clearance.[48]

The other provinces will be covered by national NGOs. CNIDAH trained the national NGOs Clube de Jovens, Apacominas, ODAH, Cassanje Desminagem e Ajuda Humanitaria, and Angola Livre de Minas to conduct non-technical survey and started surveying in June 2011. CNIDAH will provide global positioning system (GPS) devices and conduct quality control (QC).[49] CNIDAH estimates the survey will cost approximately US$6.7 million, the same as the first LIS,[50] and it has planned to complete the survey in 2013.[51]

Mine clearance in 2010

Mine clearance operators in Angola include international NGOs, the FAA, commercial companies, and INAD. In 2010, four NGO operators[52] cleared approximately the same amount of land as in 2009. INAD had slightly lower outputs in all categories in 2010 than it did the previous year.

DCA (40 deminers), HALO (386), MAG (60), and NPA (44) have a combined total of 530 deminers.[53]At the end of 2009, INAD had 22 demining teams and approximately 1,000 personnel operating in 16 provinces. INAD’s 2010 capacity was not reported but they had planned to add 450 deminers.[54]

INAD demining in 2010

INAD, the FAA, and commercial companies clear mines in support of Angola’s national development plans in order to re-build the infrastructure damaged by the conflict that ended in 2002. There is no available information on survey or clearance by the FAA and commercial demining companies.

INAD’s priorities include demining in support of efforts to build or rehabilitate airports, railways, bridges, hydroelectric power, schools, hospitals, roads, and communications, highlighted by the clearing of land to lay fiber optic cables. Much of the demining by INAD involves verifying land as not being contaminated rather than actually clearing contaminated land of mines.[55]

In 2010, INAD reported manual demining of 33.32km² in 15 provinces in conducting 61 tasks given by the CED. Within the same tasks it also verified 479km² of railways, roads, border posts, airports, powerlines, and land for housing and fiber optic cables. Additionally INAD cleared a football pitch and land owned by a private company. In Lunda Sul, where Angola’s diamond mines are located and where the most clearance was conducted in 2010, clearance was conducted mainly to lay fiber optic cables.[56]

INAD reported finding 689 antipersonnel mines and 49 antivehicle mines in all its mine clearance, road and land verification, and EOD activities.[57] No antipersonnel mines were found in Zaire, Cabinda, Uige, and Cunene while clearing area totaling 8.12km². In Huila, the Executive Commission for Demining (Comissão Executiva de Desminagem, CED) tasked INAD to clear the property of SOCOLIL, a private company in Angola involved in food processing. INAD cleared 10,642m² and found 66,311 small arms and ammunition, 24,228 UXO and 78 antipersonnel mines from the property at the site.[58] The purpose of the clearance was to support Angola’s national development plans. It did not reduce the number of SHAs in the database.

In 2010 INAD’s eight mechanical demining teams cleared 11.98km² of contaminated area and found 150 antipersonnel mines, 12 antivehicle mines, and 783 items of UXO.[59]

INAD clearance results, by province, in 2010[60]

Area verified by INAD in 2010[61]

NGO demining in 2010

In 2010, four international NGOs cleared almost 4km² and found 6,870 antipersonnel mines, 808 antivehicle mines, and 7,812 items of UXO, a similar output to 2009.[62] As of the end of 2010, capacity consisted of 530 deminers with four international NGOs. MgM did not respond to a request from the Monitor for information. MgM operates in Kuando Kubango and Cunene and in 2010 was awarded a contract by the EC to clear roads and to participate in LIS II.[63]

Mine clearance in 2010[64]

N/R = Not reported

Roads

During the long conflict and for several years afterwards primary, secondary and tertiary roads were inaccessible due to a fear of mines. Vast amounts of roads have since been checked for mine contamination and, according to INAD, all major roads have been cleared and were being paved with asphalt as planned by the Ministry of Public Works and Road Institute of Angola, who are responsible for the road project. The government was considering making the clearance of secondary roads over the next four years one of its reconstruction priorities.[65]

INAD reported verifying 72km of road in 2009 and 89kmin 2010.Since 2008, INAD reports it has verified 860km of road in all 18 provinces.[66]

Since 2002, HALO has opened 4,922km of primary and secondary road across Benguela, Huambo, Kuando Kubango, and Kuito using its Road Threat Reduction (RTR) system, which uses a combination of metal detectors and heavily weighted trailers to simulate a truck, of which it was used on 804 kilometers in Kuando Kubango. In 2010, HALO used its RTR system on 614km of road and verified another 574km.[67]

NPA stopped clearing roads in 2008 due to a major reduction in capacity and concentrates its activities on community demining and land release.[68]

Since 2007 in Moxico MAG has opened 365 kilometers of road and verified another 17 kilometers. MAG has also cleared 1.8km² of road over this period, finding 12 antipersonnel mines and seven antivehicle mines.[69]

Land Rights[70]

Land rights are deeply rooted in Portuguese colonial practices and tribal traditions that still largely determine land ownership. A Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD)-commissioned study on land rights concluded that with two-thirds of the population living in rural areas in Angola, the return of internally displaced persons and refugees combined with ambitious development plans that include commercial agriculture and the construction of one million houses, land rights issues and mine action overlap in their impact in the development of post-war Angola.

While mine clearance impacts the use of the land and can start a grab for newly cleared areas, mine action operators have not been active in land rights issues. The GICHD study found that the international NGOs are often approached by people to clear land because they believe the NGOs do not clear land for large-scale development projects.

INAD, the largest mine clearance operator in the country, believes they have no role in resolving disputes or that mine clearance is even the primary reason for the dispute. Leonardo Sapalo, the executive director of INAD, told the GICHD that the government of Angola tasks them based on national development priorities and if there are land rights issues, which are usually between the owner and the occupant on a matter unrelated to mines, they are resolved by the government or the soba, the village leader.

The GICHD recommends that land rights be mainstreamed into mine action through better coordination with development NGOs whose mandates may include land rights. It also calls for land issues to be documented through land release surveys and for transparent handover procedures that clearly indicate the intended beneficiaries of mine clearance in order to establish aspects of land tenure.

Post Clearance Land Use[71]

In 2009, from 73 cleared minefields, HALO surveyed a sample of 25 of the cleared minefields in Benguela province—land from which, on average, 117 families benefited—to understand the impact clearance has had on communities. Conflicts over land ownership were not cited as reasons for any delay in using cleared land. The survey found that all cleared mined areas, which averaged 33,000m² in size, were in productive use, usually within three months of clearance, although if the land was close to where the farmers lived, productive use of the land was even more rapid.

The survey found the most common use of land following clearance was agriculture, followed by infrastructure such as housing and bridges. HALO also found that availability of water and irrigation systems significantly affected the time it took before the land became productive. For example, farmers who relied on rain-fed crops took much longer to make the cleared land productive, and by relying on seasonal rains the crop yield was less than that found on irrigated land. In addition, farmers who were able to use irrigation had high enough yields that they could sell their produce in local markets while those relying on seasonal rains were mostly sustenance farmers.

One finding of the survey was the role a proper handover can have on using the land. The HALO survey found that owners present at the handover were quicker in using the land. When they were not present at the handover, landowners seemed to hesitate before beginning farming, instead, they would start grazing and only later, if there were no mine accidents, would they feel safe to start farming or building homes. As a result of the survey, HALO has revised its procedures to ensure that owners or future users are always present at the handover. In 2011, HALO planned to conduct a similar survey, in either Bié or Kuando Kubango province.

Compliance with Article 5 of the Mine Ban Treaty

Under Article 5 of the Mine Ban Treaty, Angola is required to destroy all antipersonnel mines in mined areas under its jurisdiction or control as soon as possible, but not later than 1 January 2013. Angola will not meet its deadline and will therefore need to request an extension.[72]

Angola plans to submit its extension request to its Article 5 deadline in March 2012.[73]CNIDAH estimates it will cost more than US$400 million to clear the remaining mined areas.[74] With the ongoing national survey not scheduled for completion until 2013, it was not clear as of August 2012 what approach Angola would take in its extension request.[75]

Battle area clearance in 2010

The amount of BAC conducted in 2010 remained low as it did in previous years.[76] In 2010, only HALO and NPA conducted BAC. INAD data does not distinguish tasks by methodology although one task included clearing 24,000 ERW and 78 antipersonnel mines in Huila province over an area of 10,642m².[77]

Battle area clearance in 2010[78]

Clearance of cluster munition remnants

In 2010, HALO destroyed nine unexploded submunitions and two abandoned cluster bombs containing 84 submunitions in Kuando Kubango during BAC over 500,000m².[79] In addition, HALO’s Weapons and Ammunition Disposal (WAD) teams, which operate in all 18 provinces destroying police, army, navy, and air force weapons caches, found and destroyed 51 submunitions in military warehouses. HALO WAD teams disposed of 506 cluster munition dispensers and 7,267 explosive bomblets in 2006–May 2011.[80]

Roving clearance/explosive ordnance disposal in 2010

HALO, MAG, and NPA have EOD teams attached to their survey component. HALO has four survey teams in Benguela, Bié, Huambo, and Kuando Kubango that provide a specialist EOD call-out service and deal with dangerous items found by the local population or unearthed during reconstruction work. MAG, in Moxico, has EOD teams that operate alongside its community liaison teams and can perform EOD tasks as they are identified. NPA has two combined survey/EOD teams in Uige Province whose primary activity is to re-survey SHAs from the LIS. When ERW are reported by the local population, the police, or the FAA, the survey teams are equipped to conduct EOD/spot tasks.[81]

During INAD’s 61 clearance and verification tasks they destroyed 31,357 ERW. INAD does not distinguish between abandoned explosive ordnance and UXO.[82]

Roving clearance/explosive ordnance disposal in 2010[83]

Quality management

Each international demining operator and INAD has its own internal quality management system. After a clearance task has been completed, CNIDAH is responsible for QC. CNIDAH admits there is lack of a funding for QC/QA, which limits what CNIDAH can do. In 2010, CNIDAH conducted 56 QC visits to 41 areas and issued 32 final certificates while QA in nine cleared areas was ongoing in June 2011.[84]

Safety of demining personnel

In October 2010, a section commander and a medic employed by HALO were killed and two of its deminers injured when a bounding fragmentation mine detonated in Cuito Cuanavale in Kuando Kubango province during clearance operations. All four received emergency first aid within minutes of the accident. The section commander died shortly afterwards in the clinic in Cuito Cuanavale while the other three were evacuated to Huambo by air. The deminer medic died while en route to Huambo. The two surviving deminers have since recovered from their injuries.[85] The HALO accident investigation concluded that the cause of the accident was the deliberate and reckless breaking of standard operating procedures by the section commander who died. HALO found that the commander had knowingly endangered his own life and the lives of those around him by crossing a minefield marking into an uncleared area and handled a tripwire that was clearly attached to a PPMiSR mine.[86]

Other Risk Reduction Measures

CNIDAH is responsible for the management, coordination, and monitoring of mine/ERW risk education (RE). UNICEF phased out RE at the end of 2008 because it was no longer a national program priority and casualties had been reduced.[87]

In 2011, the government of Angola failed to authorize spending for RE, creating a funding shortage for national NGOs, the main implementers of RE, and resulting in no formal RE program.[88] According to CNIDAH, the government failed to include RE in its budget appropriation to CNIDAH, which considers it an oversight on the part of the government rather than a policy decision. CNIDAH’s expects RE funding to be re-instated for 2012.[89] The UN 2011 Portfolio of Mine Action Projects did not include any RE projects for Angola.

Aside from RE linked with demining sites there appears to be no active RE program in Angola. CNIDAH officials in Benguela and Kuando Kubango confirmed to the Monitor there was no RE being conducted in their provinces.[90]

The Angolan Red Cross conducted a survey on the knowledge of the risk of mines among the local population. The findings were surprising for a country considered one of the most mine-affected in the world. The survey found older Angolans knew very little about mines and returnees from Zambia and other neighboring countries were unaware of the risk. The Red Cross concluded there was a continuing need for RE in Huila.[91]

The Ministry of Education is no longer involved in RE as a result of changes in personnel within the ministry. The changes broke the link between CNIDAH and Ministry of Education.[92]

 

Casualties Overview

In 2010, the Monitor identified 42 mine/explosive remnants of war (ERW) casualties in Angola.[1] This is an increase from the 28 confirmed casualties in 2009; however, the 2009 data provided by the Inter-sectoral Commission on Demining and Humanitarian Assistance (Comissão Nacional Intersectorial de Desminagem e Assistência Humanitária, CNIDAH) indicated that there may have been many more casualties, as poor data quality made it impossible to confirm and thus to determine conclusive trends from one year to the next.[2] 

Children made up half of all confirmed casualties (21) and the majority of casualties for which the age was known: 10 were boys, eight were girls, and the gender of three children was not known. Most child casualties (15) were caused by ERW; for the other six, the type of victim-activated explosive item that caused the incidents was not known. Mines were the greatest cause of adult casualties: nine having been caused by antipersonnel mines, four by antivehicle mines, and one by a mine of unspecified type.[3]

All casualties where the civil status was known were civilians. Three demining accidents caused six deminer casualties: two in Moxico province and one in Kuando Kubango. All were caused by antipersonnel mines.[4]

No casualties from cluster munition remnants were identified in Angola in 2010. However, given that devices are not adequately differentiated, it is possible that cluster munition remnants casualties were among those recorded as caused by ERW (16) and unknown explosive items (12), which together made up two thirds of all casualties in 2010.

The total number of mine/ERW casualties in Angola is unknown, though estimates range from 23,000[5] to 80,000.[6] No details were available to substantiate these figures, however, and in 2009 it was reported that fewer than 300 casualties were entered in CNIDAH’s central database.[7] By June 2011, 2,198 survivors had been registered in the provinces of Huila and Namibe as part of the national mine/ERW victim survey; 16 provinces remained to be surveyed.[8] Between 2000 and 2010, the Monitor identified 2,734 mine/ERW casualties including 903 killed, 1,686 injured, and 145 for which the outcome was unknown.[9]

No information was available on the number of cluster munition casualties. Angola expected to have more information on cluster munition survivors after the completion of the national victim survey. However the survey questionnaire offers just three options as the cause of disability: “a mine,” “an accident,” or “unknown” and has no place to report on cluster submunitions as the cause.[10]

Victim Assistance

The total number of survivors in Angola is unknown, but there are many thousands. As of May 2011, 2,198 survivors had been identified in the first two (of 18) provinces surveyed as part of the national victim survey.[11]

Assessing victim assistance needs

In October 2010, CNIDAH launched the national victim survey and needs assessment. The purpose of the survey is to identify and register mine and cluster munition survivors with disabilities, understand their living situation, and determine what needs to be done to promote their socio-economic inclusion.[12] By May 2011, the survey had been carried out in Huila and Namibe, two of 18 provinces, and was underway in the provinces of Cunene and Cabinga.[13] Handicap International (HI) reported having received training to assist in the implementation of the survey.[14] However, local participation appeared to be lacking and of nine survivor and disabled persons associations and NGO service providers interviewed in Huila province, just one was consulted in the collection of data in that province. Furthermore, not all the questionnaires completed by this organization were included in survey results.[15] The provincial Ministry of Assistance and Social Reintegration (MINARS) in Huila, with responsibility for maintaining a registry of all persons with disabilities in the province, was also not contacted during data collection.[16]

As of June 2011, survey results from Namibe province, the first province completed, had been shared through a public report launch event held in the province.[17] It was expected that the results from other provinces would be shared in a similar way.

Victim assistance coordination[18]

CNIDAH’s victim assistance coordination efforts in 2010 were focused on improving coordination at the provincial level and launching the national victim survey. A victim assistance specialist was employed in the CNIDAH headquarters staff to work with CNIDAH provincial offices to improve victim assistance planning and implementation.[19] Workshops were held in Moxico, Kuando Kubango, Cabinda, and Úige with provincial CNIDAH representatives and other governmental and nongovernmental victim assistance stakeholders, with the aim of developing provincial victim assistance plans. As of June 2011, the first provincial plan had been finalized in Cabinda province.[20] CNIDAH convened a national victim assistance meeting with church leaders in August 2010 to involve churches in the implementation of the last year of the Victim Assistance Action Plan.[21]  A national meeting to evaluate progress in implementing the Victim Assistance Action Plan with all victim assistance stakeholders had been planned for 2010 but was canceled due to a lack of funds.[22]

CNIDAH reported that it increased attention and financial resources to provincial coordination of victim assistance.[23] However NGOs involved in victim assistance in Huila province criticized CNIDAH as being almost absent at both the provincial and national levels.[24] A provincial representative of MINARS noted a lack of communication on the part of CNIDAH.[25] Some provincial CNIDAH representatives also stated that they had no information about victim assistance activities in their province.[26]

The National Rehabilitation Program (PNR) coordinates all physical rehabilitation services. However, in 2010, PNR’s capacity was seen to be very weak or even inactive, leaving orthopedic centers to develop their own budgets and find their own sources of raw materials.[27]

Throughout 2010, there were active NGO networks made up of survivors and disabled persons associations in the provinces of Benguela, Huambo, and Huila coordinating advocacy and awareness-raising efforts on the rights of survivors and other persons with disabilities. Provincial NGO networks worked to improve coordination with local authorities on disability issues. [28]

Angola provided updates on its victim assistance progress in 2010 at the Tenth Meeting of States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty in Geneva in December 2010 and at the Convention on Cluster Munitions intersessional meetings in Geneva in June 2011, but not at the First Meeting of States Parties to the Convention on Cluster Munitions in Vientiane, Lao PDR in November 2010, nor at the Mine Ban Treaty intersessional meetings in Geneva in June 2011.[29] Angola provided limited information on victim assistance activities in Form J of its last Mine Ban Treaty Article 7 report submitted, for the period from January 2009 to July 2010.[30]

Survivor Inclusion

Survivors’ associations and disabled persons organizations were invited to provincial CNIDAH victim assistance coordination meetings, but felt that while the meetings were used by CNIDAH to disseminate information, survivors and other persons with disabilities were not included in decision-making.[31]  Some survivors and/or representatives of survivors associations collected data for the national victim survey.[32] Survivors implemented socio-economic reintegration projects and were involved in advocacy for the rights of persons with disabilities through survivor associations and disabled persons organizations.[33]

Service accessibility and effectiveness

Victim assistance activities in 2010[34]

 

There were no significant improvements in the accessibility or quality of victim assistance services in Angola in 2010. A lack of government funding for physical rehabilitation caused a decline in both the quality and accessibility of these services in 2010.[35] A lack of transportation, poor quality of roads, and insufficient availability of accommodation for survivors receiving services made up the greatest obstacles to access services for survivors living outside the provincial capital.[36]

No changes were reported in access or quality of emergency or continuing medical care.

According to CNIDAH, a lack of funding and materials forced some physical rehabilitation centers to reduce the services offered to survivors and other persons with disabilities.[37] Four physical rehabilitation centers reported that they had insufficient materials to meet the demand for mobility devices and that services had declined compared with previous years.[38] Two centers also noted that the poor condition of their facilities and lack of vital equipment and services, such as electricity, restricted their ability to provide adequate rehabilitation services.[39] While the Benguela Rehabilitation Center reported an improvement in staff capacity following training through the Don Bosco School in El Salvador, the Luena Rehabilitation Center had to withdraw staff from the same training program before completion due to insufficient funding.[40] Among respondents to the national victim survey in Huila province, between 50% and 70% stated that they had mobility devices; however, the majority of those with relevant mobility devices responded that the devices were in poor condition. Just 20% of survivors requiring prosthetic arms or hearing devices had these items.[41]

Psychological support services for survivors continued to be essentially non-existent in 2010.[42] As in previous years, some survivor and disabled persons organizations provided peer support services.[43] The ongoing national victim survey did not include any questions regarding access to or need for psychological support.[44]

There were no significant changes in economic inclusion. MINARS continued to provide referrals for vocational training and limited support for income-generating activities.[45] Numerous NGOs also continued to provide training and support for the development of small businesses.[46] Fewer than 15% of victim survey respondents in Huila had formal employment.[47]

While the law prohibited discrimination against persons with disabilities, it was not enforced and discrimination remained prevalent.[48] Despite legislation entitling persons with disabilities to a pension, just 1% of respondents to the national victim survey had received any financial support.[49] There was no legislation mandating accessibility for persons with disabilities to public or private facilities.[50] In 2010, the Protection Law for Persons with Disabilities, drafted in 2000, was aligned with Angola’s new constitution and submitted for a review of its financial implications.[51] As of June 2011, the draft law had not been included among a list of laws pending approval during the course of that year.[52]

As of 15 July 2011, Angola had not signed the CRPD nor was it seen as a priority.[53]

 

In 2010 the government of Angola contributed AOA2,675,280,062 (US$29,183,023) toward its mine action program.[1]

In 2010, national funding supported the activities of the Inter-sectoral Commission on Demining and Humanitarian Assistance (Comissão Nacional Intersectorial de Desminagem e Assistência Humanitária, CNIDAH) with funding for coordination (salaries), quality control, and CNIDAH provincial offices.[2] In addition, national funding supported the Executive Commission for Demining (Comissão Executiva de Desminagem, CED)—established in 2005 to fund development projects and provide financial support to the demining operations of the Angolan Armed Forces (Forças Armadas Angolanas, FAA)—the National Reconstruction Office (Gabinete de Reconstrução Nacional, GRN), and the National Demining Institute (Instituto Nacional de Desminagem, INAD). In 2010 it funded INAD, 55 demining brigades, equipment maintenance in Lubango and Huambo, new equipment, and the orthopedic center in Viana.[3]

The amount of clearance and verification for development projects achieved in 2009 and 2010, as well as the number of commercial demining companies, indicate the government of Angola has allocated significant funding through the CED for demining and the national orthopedic and rehabilitation centers. However, CNIDAH, INAD, or the CED have not reported on annual financial expenditures. Orthopedic and rehabilitation centers have not provided reports on activities and beneficiaries related to the funding levels. Many national NGOs reported in interviews and in response to questionnaires that few services are available for persons with disabilities, including landmine/explosive remnants of war survivors.

The government of Angola allocated AOA1,537,701,660 ($16,733,860) for CNIDAH and AOA1,137,578,962  ($12,409,163) for INAD in 2010, amounts similar to 2009. As of June 2011 final expenditures for each institution were not available.[4]

Government of Angola support to CNIDAH and INAD: 2009–2010[5]

Angola has been one of the largest recipients of international mine action funding. From 2006–2010 it received a total of $151 million, or more than $30 million per year. 

In 2010, 10 states and the European Commission (EC) contributed $42,298,823 to mine action in Angola, led by the EC which awarded five international NGOs and one French commercial company €20 million ($26,522,000) for 2010–2012.[6] Almost all contributions were for clearance; only the Netherlands and Germany provided funding for victim assistance.

International contributions: 2010[7]

N/R = not reported

Summary of contributions: 2006–2010[8]

N/R = not reported