The Czech Republic
signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 3 December 1997, but has not yet ratified. It was
an active participant in all the treaty preparatory meetings and the
negotiations in Oslo, and endorsed the pro-treaty Brussels Declaration in June
1997. The Czech Republic voted in favor of the United Nations General Assembly
resolutions supporting a ban on landmines in 1996, 1997, and 1998. An official
from the Czech Republic’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs attended the
Regional Conference on Landmines in Budapest, Hungary on 26-28 March 1998, where
he said that a draft ratification and draft implementation law would be
submitted to the Parliament “as soon as possible for discussion and
approval.”[1]
The Czech Republic is a state party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons
and ratified the amended Protocol II on 10 August 1998. The Czech Republic is
not a member of the Conference on Disarmament (CD), but has expressed support
for the CD as a forum for encouraging universal adherence to the Mine Ban
Treaty.[2]
Production, Transfer, and Stockpiling
The former Czechoslovakia was a significant
producer and exporter of arms, including antipersonnel mines. The Czech
Republic inherited the AP mine production facilities when the country
divided.[3] Czechoslovak state
factories produced ten types of antipersonnel landmines: the PP-Mi-Ba, the
PP-Mi-D, the PP-Mi-D II, the PP-Mi-Sb, the PP-Mi-Sr, the PP-Mi-Sr II, the
PP-MI-St-46, the PP-Mi-Na, the PP-Mi-S1, and the
PP-Mi-Sk.[4] Czechoslovakian
mines were widely exported and used in Afghanistan, Angola, Cambodia, the former
East Germany, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Namibia, Nicaragua, Somalia, South
Africa, and Zambia.[5]
According to the Czech government, production of antipersonnel mines was
halted in 1990. The Czech Republic imposed a three year moratorium on AP mine
exports in October 1994, and extended it indefinitely in November
1997.[6]
By December 1997, the Czech Republic had destroyed all 44,353 non-detectable
antipersonnel mines in its stocks that did not comply with CCW Protocol
II.[7] On 23 May 1998, the
Czech Minister of Defense approved a stockpile elimination plan calling for
complete elimination by 30 June 2001. The remaining 330,000 AP mines will be
destroyed by disassembling and recycling certain materials, such as scrap metal
and TNT components. The Ministry of Defense plans to retain approximately 4,000
antipersonnel mines for training
purposes.[8]
Landmine Problem
The Czech Republic government reported in 1995
that troops from the former Soviet Union had left approximately two tons of
mines in waste dumps, in weapon pits, and in the ground near the Ralsko and
Mlada military bases, which were occupied by Soviet troops from 1968 to 1991.
Army demining units, with the assistance of three NGOs, Enmotec SRO, Geofyzika
AS, and GMS AS, have been clearing these bases of mines, and expect to have
completed the task by the end of
1999.[9]
Mine Action
The Czech Republic has donated $22,500 to the
United Nations Voluntary Trust Fund for Assistance in Mine Clearance. In 1997
the Czech government donated CHF 6,000 to the ICRC to help mine
victims.[10] Czech IFOR and
SFOR soldiers engaged in mine clearance in
Bosnia-Herzegovina.[11] The
Czech government has said that “as international assistance to mine
victims is concerned, health facilities in the Czech Republic are ready to admit
for paid medical treatment a limited number of landmine victims, in particular
children, and to ensure the supply of all necessary
prostheses.”[12] In
January 1999, the governments of Slovenia and the Czech Republic signed a
declaration of cooperation in support of the International Trust Fund of the
Republic of Slovenia for Demining, Mine Clearance and Assistance to Mine Victims
in Bosnia and Herzegovina, based in Ljubljana,
Slovenia.[13]
[1] Statement at Budapest
Conference by Dr. Miroslav Tuma, Deputy Director of the Department of UN
Organizations for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Czech Republic.
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