Contamination and Impact

The Socialist Republic of Vietnam is heavily contaminated by explosive remnants of war (ERW), mainly unexploded ordnance (UXO) and mostly dating back to the war with the United States (US) in the 1960s and first half of the 1970s. This contamination is among the most extensive contamination from cluster munition remnants in the world. There is, however, no precise estimate of how much contamination remains. Vietnam says ERW affect all of its 63 provinces and cities and officials continue to assert contamination covers 66,000km², one-fifth of its total land area.[1]

Mines

Vietnam has a smaller, also undefined, problem of mines. Most were left by conflicts in the 1970s with neighboring Cambodia and China and affect areas close to its borders with those countries.[2] Some mines are also found around former US military installations.[3]

Vietnam cleared an area up to 1km deep along its northern border under an agreement with China, but areas further inland from the border are still contaminated with mines emplaced by the military of both countries. Since 2004, military engineers have reportedly cleared around 95km² of contaminated land in the northern provinces of Lang Son, Cao Bang, Ha Giang, Lai Chau, and Quang Ninh bordering China under a project known as “Program 120,” destroying mainly Type 72, K58, and PPM-2 antipersonnel mines.[4]

Cambodian border areas were affected by randomly placed mines reflecting the more irregular nature of the fighting there,[5] but the Engineering Command reported in 2013 that the problem had been eliminated.[6] Many ports and river deltas were mined extensively during the war and were not completely cleared when it ended and some sea mines have been found on the coast.[7]

Mine Action Program

Vietnam’s mine action program is undergoing a period of transition. A Prime Minister’s Decision in 2006 assigned the Ministry of National Defense to oversee mine action at the national level with clearance undertaken by the Army Engineering Corps of the People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN),[8] and with BOMICEN, part of the Ministry of National Defense, acting as a central coordinating body for clearance and survey by national operators.[9] International NGOs are required to conclude an agreement with the People’s Aid Coordinating Committee (PACCOM) and separate agreements with authorities in each of the provinces where they work.

An inter-ministerial National Steering Committee (NSC) launched in December 2011 and chaired by the prime minister oversees mine action,[10] supported by a 21-member Standing Committee or Executive Office, chaired by the Vice Minister of Defense, Sr. Lt. Gen Nguyen Chi Vinh.[11] The Executive Office, which is supposed to meet quarterly, decides mine action priorities and makes recommendations to the NSC.[12]

In 2013, Vietnam announced plans to establish a national mine action center (VNMAC) reporting to the Prime Minister’s office to strengthen the direction and coordination of mine action. The center is to be the focal point of mine action operations, the location for a national mine action database, and in charge of mobilizing international and national resources. Fund raising for the center was due to start in 2014 and the center is expected to be operational in two years. Work is also underway drafting a new mine action law that will replace the 2006 decree putting the Ministry of National Defense in charge of mine action and establishing it as a civilian program under the prime minister.[13]

Strategic planning

The new mine action center falls within a National Mine Action Plan for 2013−2015[14] released in May 2013. The plan calls for clearance of 1,000km² a year to support socio-economic development, giving priority to provinces with the highest levels of contamination and accidents. Engineering Command estimates that, to achieve such a target, it would need to at least double the number of clearance teams.

Land Release

Clearance is undertaken mostly by the Army Engineering Corps, operating with some 250 mine/UXO clearance teams each comprising some 20 to 25 personnel in each team. As of June 2013, these included teams operated by 52 military companies.[15] Clearing residual mine contamination in northern Vietnam is the responsibility of provincial army commands.[16] Four international NGOs operated in 2013 but conducted battle area clearance and roving explosive ordnance disposal (EOD), not mine clearance.

Army engineers cleared 450km² of ERW contamination in 2012[17] but were said to have cleared 1,000km² in 2013. How the increase was achieved was not immediately apparent.[18] Army clearance reporting does not provide details of mine clearance.

Area clearance by three of the four humanitarian operators[19] totaled 3.4km² in 2013, marginally more than they cleared the previous year, but most items of ordnance were destroyed in roving EOD operations. Mines Advisory Group (MAG), the biggest of the NGO operators with 162 survey and clearance staff, cleared one 700m² mined area and one cluster munitions task but conducted close to 16,000 roving tasks accounting for most of the UXO and submunitions it destroyed. MAG planned to close operations in Quang Binh province in mid-2014 but to expand them in Quang Bing and Quang Tri provinces, subject to continued funding from the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development.[20]

Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA), which has managed Project Renew since 2012, continued to work in Quang Tri province (where it deployed three EOD teams) and in Thua Thien Hue province (with one EOD team); but NPA also conducted its cluster munition remnants survey in both provinces and was due in 2014 to provide technical advice for a joint Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation (VVAF) and BOMICEN land release project employing the Cluster Munition Remnant Survey (CMRS) methodology. NPA has worked additionally with Quang Tri authorities to establish a provincial database due to be fully operational, containing data from 2008 on, by early 2014.[21]

Solidarity Service International (SODI) teams, operating with 122 staff in 2013 in Quang Tri and Thua Thien Hue provinces, came under management of APOPO in 2014 but expected to receive less funding and to have to make major cuts in staffing.[22]

International NGO clearance in 2013

Support

Vietnam reportedly spent “$20 to 30 million” on mine clearance operations in 2013.[23]