Cape Verde’s Minister of Foreign Affairs,
Amilcar Spencer Lopes, signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 4 December 1997 and in a
statement to the signing ceremony, he said, “Cape Verde, a small country
which doesn’t produce, use, or import antipersonnel mines, launches an
appeal to all states, particularly those who are not participating in this
Conference, to rally to the objective of the Ottawa Convention, which is the
total elimination of these crippling
devices.”[1] Cape Verde
has not yet ratified. According to the government the ratification papers are at
the National Assembly waiting
approval.[2] Cape Verde endorsed
the Brussels Declaration and attended the Oslo negotiations. Cape Verde also
supported all the key UN General Assembly resolutions in support of banning
landmines.
According to a government official Cape Verde maintains no stockpile of
anti-personnel landmines.[3] Cape
Verde is a former Portuguese colony four hundred miles off the coast of Senegal.
Although many Cape Verdians took part in the armed struggle against the
Portuguese, most of the fighting was in Guinea-Bissau so there are no stockpiles
of landmines on the islands.
[1]Amilcar Spencer Lopes,
Minister of Foreign Affairs, Cape Verde, Statement to Signing Ceremony, Ottawa,
4 December 1997. Unofficial translation from French by LM Researcher.
[2]Telephone interview with
Jorge Silva, Desk of Bilateral Accords in the Secretariat of International
Cooperation, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Praia, 25 March 1999.
[3]Telephone interview,
Luís Dupret, the Director of International Cooperation, Ministry of
Foreign Affairs, Praia, 25 March 1999.