Casualties and Victim Assistance

Summary findings

·         The Somali Republic lacked coordination and planning of victim assistance for mine/explosive remnants of war (ERW survivors), including health and disability services

·         The security situation significantly hampered existing efforts to implement assistance

·         An extensive survey of mine/ERW survivors in Mogadishu demonstrated a significant need for work and training opportunities for economic inclusion

Victim assistance commitments

Somalia is responsible for significant numbers of mine/ERW survivors, though the total number is unknown. Somalia has commitments to provide victim assistance as a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty, which entered into force for the state on 1 October 2012.

Casualties

Casualties Overview

At least 66 mine/ERW casualties were recorded by UN Mine Action Service (UNMAS) in Somalia (excluding Somaliland) in 2012.[1] All but one casualty was a civilian. Of the casualties reported, 71% were children, including 37 boys and 9 girls (and one gender unknown), 15 were men, and four were women. This is a large increase in child casualties compared to the 41% figure reported in 2011. At least 146 mine/ERW casualties were recorded in Somalia (excluding Somaliland) in 2011 and 159 in 2010.[2]

However, the large difference between annual reported casualty statistics in 2012, compared to 2010 and 2011, cannot be seen as an accurate indication of change due to the lack of accurate and consistent casualty data across the years. According to UNMAS, the significant underreporting of casualties and the absence of a comprehensive national casualty monitoring mechanism was one of the greatest challenges to reducing death and injury; also, the lack of baseline data made monitoring of trends impossible.[3]

It was often not possible to adequately distinguish between attacks by command-detonated improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and incidents involving victim-activated IEDs, which are de facto landmines, with this data.[4] No information was provided for 2012.

Of the total casualties for Somalia in 2012, five were reported by the Puntland Mine Action Center (PMAC).[5] However PMAC reported in its 2012 Annual Report there were 16 mine/unexploded ordnance (UXO) victims and 32 IED victims in Puntland in 2012.[6] This is a significant decrease in mine/UXO casualties compared to previous years when PMAC recorded 35 in 2011 and 41 in 2010.[7]

The Monitor identified 2,851 mine/ERW casualties in Somalia (excluding Somaliland) between 1999 and the end of 2012. Of these, 962 people were killed, 1,756 were injured, and the state of the remaining 133 casualties (whether killed or not) was unknown.[8]

Victim Assistance

The Monitor identified at least 1,756 mine/ERW survivors by the end of 2012.

Assessing victim assistance needs

The Somalia Coalition to Ban Landmines (SOCBAL) conducted a survey of mine/ERW survivors in Mogadishu in collaboration with the Institute for Education for Disabled People (IEDP) in July 2013.[9] The majority of survivors and their families in Mogadishu are in camps for internally displaced persons. The SOCBAL survey team visited eight such camps and also observed the living conditions of the mine/ERW survivors, recognizing that they are also in the situation of extremely vulnerable persons. The overall purpose of the survey was to better understand the number of survivors who live in the city, the extent of survivor’s needs, and if any form of assistance has been provided. In total, 850 survivors were surveyed, 719 males and 131 females (including 83 boys and 14 girls under 15 years old).[10]

No baseline information exists on the prevalence and circumstances of persons with disabilities, including mine/UXO survivors. The Ministry of Social Development is responsible for compiling, storing, and managing information on disability, but it did not have an information system on persons with disabilities.[11] Following the collapse of the former central government of Somalia in 1991, no ministry has been managing or recording issues related to persons with disabilities in Somalia.[12] In 2012, Somalia reported that mine/ERW casualty data was stored in the national Information System for Mine Action (IMSMA).[13]

In Puntland, PMAC collected “victim data and mine/UXO accident reports” from various sources, including police stations, regional liaison officers, hospitals, and other government officials. The PMAC operations section regularly visited police stations and hospitals as follow-up.[14]

Survivors interviewed during the 2013 SOCBAL survey often reported that they had already been surveyed several times, including having their contact details and photographs taken by international and local NGOs, but were frustrated that no assistance had followed.[15]

Coordination

There was no specific victim assistance coordination in Somalia. The Ministry of Social Development is the leading agency for disability issues including victim assistance; however, there was no relevant legislation regarding the needs and rights of survivors.[16] Nor was there any available information about any relevant national planning, focal point, or survivor participation.

In April 2013, the director of SOCBAL met with officials from UMMAS-Somalia to discuss victim assistance activities. Challenges to coordination included the lack of a fully functional national mine action center and the absence of governmental focal point in the ministry concerned with victim assistance. However, subject to funding availability, there was a will to start victim assistance programs in the near future.[17]

Implementing a mine victim assistance program was included in the PMAC annual plan for 2012; however, no progress on this objective was reported in the PMAC Annual Report for 2012.[18]

Somalia provided detailed information on victim assistance and the existing lack of planning and services in Form J of its initial Mine Ban Treaty Article 7 report.[19] Somalia did not make statements on victim assistance at the Twelfth meeting of States Parties to the Mine Ban Treaty in December 2012, or at the meeting of the Standing Committee on Victim Assistance and Socio-Economic Reintegration in May 2013.

Victim assistance in 2012

In 2012, survivors in Somalia received minimal services in every aspect of victim assistance.[20] A survey of 850 survivors in Mogadishu in 2013 found that survivors were concerned about societal discrimination, a lack of services, and fulfillment of basic rights because they did not have access to healthcare, education, or employment opportunities.[21]

Somalia lacked adequate rehabilitation services and facilities, qualified medical practitioners, as well as social inclusion programs for persons with disabilities. There was a lack of mobility and other assistive devices; locations where they were available were often difficult to access due to conflict and poverty.[22] Persons with disabilities also lacked economic inclusion activities.[23]

Service accessibility and effectiveness

Emergency and continuing medical care

Ongoing conflict in 2012 continued to erode the minimal health resources available. The number of war-wounded patients requiring treatment in hospitals in Mogadishu decreased in 2012 compared to previous years.[24] In 2012, the ICRC supported 11 hospitals in Somalia, who in turn assisted 2,503 weapon-wounded patients, which included 68 people who were injured by mines or ERW.[25]

Violence against healthcare workers, health facilities, and patients also posed a serious challenge to assistance activities.[26] The ICRC supported the provision of first aid through 55 posts in predominantly war-affected areas in 2012.[27] The independently run ambulance service in Mogadishu continued to operate despite the high risk to voluntary emergency personnel operating the eight available vehicles.[28] In 2013, it was reported that some of the mine/ERW victims had serious health conditions due to infection of their injuries, but they had not received hospital care.[29]

The ICRC continued to provide medical supplies, equipment, funds, staff training, and supervision, along with infrastructure maintenance, to the two hospitals in Mogadishu where most weapon-wounded casualties were treated: Keysaney (run by the Somali Red Crescent Society, SRCS) and Medina (community-run). Supplies were provided, as needed, to other facilities.[30] A surgical operating theatre was constructed at Keysaney Hospital in 2011, which had been hit by artillery fire and damaged on numerous occasions. In January 2012, Keysaney was struck again by two mortar shells.[31] Two Somali doctors continued specialist surgical training in 2012, supported by the ICRC. Medical staff from southern and central Somalia received training supported by the ICRC through specific courses and supervision.[32]

UNMAS employs an emergency team of a dozen Somali medics who provide on-site assistance. The team of medics also provides emergency support at local hospitals and conducts medical training for hospital staff, mine action partners, local staff members, and police explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) units.[33]

Physical rehabilitation including prosthetics

Somalia reported that “There are no organizations known to be providing rehabilitation services for landmine survivors in Somalia except in Somaliland.”[34] However, the Norwegian Red Cross Society continued to provide support to physical rehabilitation centers run by the SRCS in Galkayo, Hargeisa, and Mogadishu, which received additional technical support from the ICRC Special Fund for the Disabled (SFD). The production of prosthetic and orthotic devices and services to beneficiaries at the Galkayo center in Puntland increased by 13% compared to 2011. The SFD also sponsored prosthetic/orthotic staff training in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.[35]

The Mogadishu survivor survey in 2013 reported that the quality of prosthetic limbs was such that they last for about two years. It was noted that some US$67 in additional costs were incurred in obtaining a prosthetic limb.[36]

Social and economic inclusion

The ICRC supported livelihood-support projects for some 120,000 vulnerable people to allow them to produce their own food or generate an income in 2012.[37]

The IEDP provides basic education and skills for persons with disabilities, and sometimes for their children; including literacy and numeracy, computer skills, carpentry and machinery, and career skills. In 2013 IEDP was looking for opportunities to assist survivors in Mogadishu identified in the SOCBAL survey.[38]

In early 2012 the NGO INTERSOS introduced a special support unit for its courses in its vocational training centers in Baidoa and in Jowhar, supported by UNHCR. Activities also included awareness-raising on disability issues for students, parents, teachers, and community members.[39]

Psychological assistance

There is almost no psychosocial support in Somalia due to the impact of the ongoing conflict, despite the significant need for such services.[40]

Laws and policies

The Transitional Federal Charter of the Somali Republic (TFC) did not address discrimination on the basis of disabilities; however, it states that the government shall guarantee the welfare of persons with disabilities.[41]

There are no laws requiring access to buildings for persons with disabilities. In 2012, it was reported that Somalia “did not have, and never had, accessible public services for persons with disabilities.” Three-quarters of all public buildings in Somalia were not accessible for wheelchair users, and there were no public transportation facilities with wheelchair access. Schools throughout the country did not accept the majority of children with disabilities as pupils.[42] In 2011, it was found that three-quarters of all public buildings were not designed to include accessibility for wheelchair users and there were no public transportation facilities with wheelchair access.[43]

As of July 2013, Somalia had not signed the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD).