Sudan is mine-affected
but humanitarian mine action efforts are severely handicapped by the
country’s continuing 16-year old civil war. Despite the unnerving
situation, efforts are on-going both to remove landmines and to spread mine
awareness among the civilian population. The main rebel group is the Sudan
People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM), whose armed forces are known as the
Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA). Both the SPLM/A, which controls an
area as large as France in southern and eastern Sudan, and the Government of
Sudan (GOS), based in Khartoum, have asked for international assistance in the
clearance of landmines. The SPLM/A has gone one step further to invite
non-governmental organizations into the areas it controls to begin mine
clearance.[1] But only a tiny
fraction of the Sudan—the largest nation in Africa—has been
cleared.
Sudan’s Minister of External Relations, Ali Othman Mohamed Taha, signed
the Mine Ban Treaty on 4 December 1997, and, in a statement to the signing
ceremony, he said that “Sudan, like many African countries, suffered from
the scourge of landmines. While landmines have been planted in the North Western
corner of our country during the Second World War, Southern Sudan experienced
them during the prolonged civil war since independence. They threaten the
civilians and impede economic development and
prosperity.”[2]
The Sudan government participated in the Ottawa Process, attending the Vienna
and Bonn preparatory meetings, endorsing the Brussels Declaration and attending
the Oslo negotiations as a full participant. The GOS also voted in favor of the
key 1996, 1997 and 1998 UN General Assembly resolutions on landmines. Sudan
government has not yet ratified the Mine Ban Treaty.
Production, Transfer and Stockpiling
Two recent reports have shed light on Sudan’s
landmine problem: an assessment report by the United Nations Department of
Humanitarian Affairs Mine Clearance and Policy Unit dated August 1997 and an
August 1998 report by the Arms Division of Human Rights Watch, Sudan: Global
Trade, Local Conflict.[3]
The Sudanese government and the SPLA have never been known to manufacture
antipersonnel landmines. But both sides have considerable knowledge in
improvisation techniques.[4]
Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) may be assembled using cheap components such
as “two wooden blades with a hinge, set over a detonator and
explosive.”[5] IEDs are also
prohibited by the Mine Ban Treaty.
The GOS and the SPLA have obtained antipersonnel mines from a variety of
different sources. The following information on mines found in Sudan gives an
indication of the various suppliers. The UN assessment team listed nineteen
types of antipersonnel mines found in Sudan:
- PRB M409 plastic-bodied blast mine (Belgium);
- Type 69 bounding fragmentation mine (China);
- Type 58, a copy of the Soviet PMN blast mine (China);
- Type 72 plastic blast mine (China);
- T/79, a copy of the Italian scatterable or hand emplaced mine (Egypt);
- No 4 blast mine (Israel);
- MAUS (Italy);
- Valmara 69 bounding fragmentation mine (Italy);
- VS-Mk2 plastic scatterable or hand emplaced mine (Italy);
Human Rights Watch identified ten types of antipersonnel mines allegedly
captured by the SPLA from the Sudan government. They include the mines already
identified by the UN assessment plus the TS-50, a small, round, plastic
antipersonnel mine with rubber pressure cap manufactured by
Italy.[7]
The current size and composition of the AP mine stockpiles of the GOS and the
SPLM/A are not known. It is unknown if the GOS has started destroying
stockpiled antipersonnel landmines as required by the treaty. Operation Save
Innocent Lives (OSIL-Sudan), the SPLA/M’s mine action NGO, notes that
“both [sides] have stockpiles and there is no way to ascertain figures
even though it is important to note that the quantity of landmines in the Sudan
can provide conflict in Africa for the coming
decade.”[8]
The GOS has provided rebel groups fighting many of its neighboring
governments with antipersonnel landmines as well as antitank mines. These have
included the Eritrean rebel group, Eritrean Islamic Jihad, which has used
antitank mines on civilian roads, and the Ugandan rebel group, the Lord’s
Resistance Army.[9] (See Eritrea
country report for details on supply to EIJ). It is unclear if any transfers
have taken place since the GOS signed the ban treaty in December 1997.
Use
The UN assessment described the conflict in
southern Sudan as “a classic guerrilla war in which the government holds
towns and cities and the insurgent forces control the
countryside.”[10] In this
type of warfare, the August 1997 UN report stated “the government uses
landmines to protect its garrison towns, and to interdict the movement of
insurgent supplies and forces. On the other side, the guerrillas use landmines
to fix government forces in the towns, and to interdict their supply lines. Both
sides also reportedly continue to use landmines to terrorize local populations
in order to diminish their support for the opposite
side.”[11]
In early 1995, there was an NGO conference with senior SPLA officers in New
Cush where they discussed landmines and considered whether they were of any
strategic or practical
importance.[12] In 1996, the SPLA
“declared a unilateral moratorium on the use of landmines provided that
there is a significant reciprocation on the side of
GOS.”[13] The SPLA
considered this initiative to be “pro-ban” and also created
Operation Save Innocent Lives (OSIL-Sudan) in part to address the issue of
landmines and UXO in the areas under their
control.[14]
In March 1999, the GOS and the SPLM/A pledged not to use mines, although
details on this agreement secured by Olara Otunnu, the United Nations
Secretary-General’s Special Representative on Children and Armed Conflict,
are not available.[15] It is
unclear if Sudan has used antipersonnel mines since it signed the ban treaty in
December 1997. The August 1997 UN report stated, “Both sides also
reportedly continue to use landmines....” In February 1999, at a major
regional conference on landmines, a representative of the government of
Sudan’s armed forces described how “GOS forces plant mine fields in
accordance to accepted rules such as sketch maps and registration of mined
areas.”[16]
Landmine Problem
The true extent of Sudan’s landmine problem
remains unknown as there has been no in-depth, country-wide survey of the
problem. Several attempts have been made, however, to assess the problem. On 25
January 1997, the GOS submitted a formal request to the United Nations,
following discussions held in New York, with the UN Department of Humanitarian
Affairs (UNDHA), for assistance in dealing with its landmine
problem.[17] The UN assessment
team analyzed several previous assessments of Sudan’s landmine problem
before concluding that the most credible estimate of the number of landmines in
Sudan is “in the range of 500,000 to 2 million landmines, with the vast
majority of those located in southern
Sudan.”[18] The Sudanese
government states that two to three million landmines and UXO cover some 800,000
quare kilometers or 32 percent of the
country.[19] It claims there are
42 types of mines and explosive ordnance from 14
countries.[20]
According to the U.S. Department of State, the desert of northern Sudan was
mined during World War Two and more “recently in new conflicts along the
northwestern border with Libya and eastern border with
Eritrea.”[21] Mines in the
sparsely populated northwest occasionally affect livestock and
smugglers.[22]
The southern regions of Equatoria, Bahr El Ghazal, and Upper Nile, the Nuba
Mountains of South Kordofan in central Sudan, and the eastern region, where
there has been fighting since 1995, are all mine-affected. Most roads in the
southern region are mined, and areas around towns such as Yei, Juba, Torit,
Kapoeta and the Ugandan border town of Kaya, are reported
mined.[23] Earlier in the
conflict, antitank mine use was more prevalent than antipersonnel mine use and
when roads were mined, the solution was not to clear them but to “open new
roads.”[24] Mined roads
have inhibited and increased the cost of delivery of humanitarian aid as it must
be delivered by air.[25]
While both sides to the conflict told UN Representative Otunnu that they
“mapped” areas where they planted mines, it seems highly unlikely
that comprehensive maps or records have been kept by either
side.[26] OSIL-Sudan has a few
maps of minefields from both sides but most were not drawn to
scale.[27] Very, very few mined
areas are marked and fenced.
Mine Clearance
The UN assessment team recommended that, ”...
until there is peace and stability, large scale mine clearance should not be
undertaken” in Sudan but it did outline a number of interim measures that
could be taken including mine awareness training, safety training courses for
all UN and NGO staff working in the south, rehabilitation of the medical system
in southern Sudan, preparations and preparatory planning for a survey as soon
as a cease fire of peace agreement is signed, designated mine action liaison
officers in the UN Humanitarian Coordination Unit in Khartoum and in UNICEF -
OLS Southern Sector in Nairobi/Lokichoggio, and finally, stigmatization of the
continuing use of landmines in
Sudan.[28]
Mine action efforts in government-controlled areas are carried out by the
Humanitarian Aid Commission (HAC) and the Sudanese army is responsible for mine
clearance. A mine action programme plan has been drawn up but implementation is
hindered by lack of resources and
funding.[29]
On the SPLA side, humanitarian affairs are the responsibility of the Sudan
Relief and Rehabilitation Association (SRRA), which created Operation Save
Innocent Lives (OSIL) to deal with the landmine problem, as outlined in its mine
action programme planning.[30]
While many international and UN agencies and local NGOs provide humanitarian
relief and limited development assistance in southern Sudan under the umbrella
of Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS), mine action assistance is scarce and
relatively recent. Mine action efforts by OSIL-Sudan in SPLA-controlled areas
started in September 1997, supported by a consortium of international and
non-governmental organizations including UNICEF/Operation Lifeline Sudan, the
International Committee of the Red Cross, Christian Church Aid, DanChurch Aid,
Norwegian Church Aid, Catholic Relief Services, Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation
Association, Church Ecumenical Action in Sudan, New Sudan Council of Churches,
and the All African Conference of
Churches.[31] It received start-up
funding from UNICEF/OLS, Christian Aid, DanChurch Aid and the ICRC, in the
amounts of U.S. $149,000 for mine clearance and U.S. $150,000 for mine
awareness.[32]
Christian Aid took up the challenge of providing mine action in southern
Sudan when it concluded that “international bodies were unwilling to
address the problem due to the ongoing conflict,” according to Dan
Collison, its programme officer for the Horn of
Africa.[33] Collison described
Christian Aid’s contribution as “a worthwhile
investment.”[34]
Since 15 September 1997, OSIL-Sudan’s mine clearance programme claims
to have located and destroyed: 216 antitank mines on 236 miles of roads; 1,963
antipersonnel mines around SPLM/A-controlled towns and villages; 1,219 cluster
bombs around Yei town and surrounding villages; and 19,521 pieces of other
UXOs.[35] OSIL-Sudan has cleared
or declared mine free many areas of agricultural land in Yei and Kajo Keji
county.[36] OSIL-Sudan mine
clearance of the Mvolo-Rumbek road is expected to facilitate land-delivered
World Food Programme relief services to Bahr El
Ghazal.[37]
OSIL-Sudan’s mine action programme has its operational headquarters in
Yei, and an office in Nairobi, Kenya. The programme includes both mine
clearance, mine clearance training and mine awareness education. The mine
clearance component is carried out by demobilized SPLA military personnel in two
demining teams consisting of twelve personnel grouped. The mine awareness team
numbers ten, five of whom are women, with women comprising most of the
leadership. OSIL-Sudan mine action programme personnel received training from
two Mines Advisory Group (MAG) consultants, using funds from Christian Church
Aid and DanChurch Aid.[38]
OSIL-Sudan’s director, Aleu Ayieny Aleu, is proud that the OSIL
clearance program is cheap compared to other country demining efforts. OSIL
clearance costs an estimated U.S. $9 per mine, according to
Aleu.[39] OSIL’s workers
are not insured and the program does not use highly paid
expatriates.[40] Aleu is
concerned, however, that more funding be given to the program: “I laid
landmines myself. I am proud that I am now clearing them. Why should they
[donors] wait for peace? The mines will remain in the
ground.”[41]
Mine Awareness
The need for mine awareness education in Sudan is
imperative due to the severity of the landmine problem. Mine awareness programs
in government-controlled areas are the responsibility of the Humanitarian Aid
Commission. The Sudanese Red Crescent and Sudanese NGOs in Khartoum grouped
under the umbrella of the Sudan Council of Voluntary Agencies (SCOVA) are also
active in the Sudan Campaign to Ban Landmines (SCBL) and in more general mine
awareness activities. The GOS also established the Disaster Management and
Refugees Studies Institute (DIMARSI) to train trainers on mine awareness in
conflict zones in Sudan.[42]
UNICEF supports OSIL-Sudan’s mine risk education activities in rebel areas
by providing training, equipment and technical support. The OSIL program focuses
on children and returning refugees and targets an estimated 300,000
people.[43]
Landmine casualties
No one knows how many casualties there have been
due to landmines in Sudan. The government of Sudan’s Humanitarian Aid
Commission estimates that Sudan has 700,000 amputees resulting from mine
accidents but to date this number has not been
verified.[44] The International
Committee of the Red Cross reported only 5,000 amputees registered in their
hospitals, according to
OSIL-Sudan.[45] The UN assessment
team claimed it “was struck by the small number of landmine casualties
reported, and the even smaller number receiving assistance at the prosthetic
centres in Khartoum, Juba, and
Lokichoggio.”[46] The
assessment concluded that “very few landmine victims survive to make it to
hospital” due to the facts that “travel in the area is so difficult,
and mechanized transportation so scarce, that non-military victims generally
tend to have to walk as much as a hundred miles to the nearest
hospital.”[47]
Landmine Survivor Assistance
While the government of Sudan provides its military
personnel with medical care, civilian medical facilities and hospitals in
government-controlled areas usually lack basic equipment, staff and resources.
A former-ICRC prosthetic clinic in Khartoum now run by the GOS produces 700 to
800 ICRC standard prosthetics per year, and 400
orthotics.[48] Satellite workshops
in southern Sudan government towns of Juba and Wau assemble the ICRC standard
prosthetic devices, fit them and provide physical therapy. Basic infrastructure
and public services in southern Sudan are practically non-existent. Some
examples of the few medical facilities follow but this list is not
comprehensive.
Norwegian People’s Aid operates four hospitals in SPLA-held locations
of Yei, Chukum, Labone and Nimule in rebel-held southern Sudan. The hospital in
Yei, which treats landmine victims, has been deliberately targeted by GOS planes
which bombed it twelve times in 1998 and to date, five times in 1999, inflicting
substantial damage and resulting in many injured and dead. On 4 March 1999, GOS
bombing damaged the operating theater and maternity ward and forced the hospital
to close temporarily.[49] NPA
also runs emergency mobile medical units and it offers vocational skills
training and small community-based programs in Chukum and Yei. NPA provides
combined food relief and agriculture assistance in southern Sudan (Eastern
Equatoria, Western Equatoria, Bahr
El-Gazhal).[50]
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) operates a hospital in Kajo
Keiji on the Sudanese side of the border with Uganda in Equatoria, southern
Sudan which treats landmine victims. On 13 January 1999, the GOS dropped five
bombs on the hospital, destroying the immunization block and extensively
damaging the surgical and outpatient
departments.[51] In Juba, the
International Committee of the Red Cross has resumed activities at the Juba
Teaching Hospital in August 1998 after a period of
absence.[52] The ICRC also treats
patients, including many mine victims, at the hospital in Lokichokio, Kenya.
The Sudan Evangelical Mission (SEM) has attempted to provide prosthetic support
by bring technicians from the Nairobi-based Jaipur Foot Project to southern
Sudan to assess the needs of
amputees.[53] The Church
Ecumenical Action in Sudan (CEAS) assists in rehabilitation efforts in southern
Sudan focusing on self-sufficiency to improve the livelihoods of the most
vulnerable people.[54]
Psychological and social support facilities for mine victims are inadequate,
if available at all in southern Sudan. Some counseling and social support
services are available at the ICRC facilities at Lokichogio and at the UNHCR
refugee camp at Kakuma, Kenya, managed by the Lutheran World Federation and the
International Rescue Committee.
[1]The SPLM/A commits itself to
unilateral demining effort in the areas under its control and commissions the
[non-governmental organization] Operation Save Innocent Lives - Sudan
(OSIL-Sudan) ... to demine the liberated areas of New Sudan and to help put an
end this scourge,” in Sudan People’s Liberation Army,
“Resolution on problem posed by proliferation of anti personnel mines in
liberated parts of New Sudan,” Statement signed by Commander Salva Khr
Mayardit, Deputy Chair, NLC/NEC (SPLM) and SPLA Chief of Genearl Staff, New
Kush-Himan, 1 November 1996.
[2]Statement to the Signing
Ceremony by His Excellency, Ali Othman Mohomed Taha, Minister of External
Relations, Ottawa, 4 December 1997.
[3]United Nations Department of
Humanitarian Affairs: Mine Clearance Policy Unit, The Landmine Situation in
Sudan Assessment Mission Report, August 1997; and Human Rights Watch,
Sudan:Global Trade, Local Impact: Arms Transfers to all Sides in the
Civil War in Sudan, New York: Human Rights Watch, August 1998.
[4]Operation Save Innocent
Lives (OSIL-Sudan/Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Association), Nairobi-Kenya,
“Landmine Information-Sudan,” signed by Aleu Ayieny Aleu, Director,
OSIL-Sudan, dated 8-1-1999 (8 January 1999), p. 2.
[5]LM Researcher interview with
Patrick Kaiuki Muiruri, chief cameraman, Reuters Television, Nairobi, 4 January
1999.
[6]“ANNEX F:
Specifications of Landmines found in Sudan,” in UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan
Assessment Mission Report - Annexes, August 1997.
[7]The antipersonnel mines
identified by HRW were: PMD-6M (Russia); No 4 (Iran); PMN (Russia, China or
Iraq); M-14 (U.S.); Type 72 (China and South Africa); Type 69 (China); POMZ -2M
(Russia, China, former East Germany, North Korea); VS-T (Italy); MAUS (Italy),
and the TS-50 (Italy), in HRW, Sudan: Global Trade, Local Impact,
p. 18.
[8]OSIL-Sudan/SRRA,
“Landmine Information-Sudan,” p. 3.
[9]HRW, Sudan: Global Trade,
Local Impact, August 1998, p. 39 and p. 40.
[10]UN/DHA/MCPA, Sudan
Assessment Mission Report, p. 7.
[15]Otunnu was reported to have
secured a ban on use of landmines in the south of the country by both parties to
the conflict. See “Sudan’s Warring Parties Agree to Stop Using
Landmines,” Reuters, Nairobi, 11 March 1999.
[16]Mustafa Othman Ebeid, Sudan
Defense Force presentation, in “The Situation from a Military Point of
View Panel,” Regional Conference on the Menace of Landmines in the Arab
Countries, Beirut, Lebanon, 11 February 1999.
[17]“ANNEX A: Request
for Assistance dated 25 January 1997,” in UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan Assessment
Mission Report - Annexes, August 1997.
[18]UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan
Assessment Mission Report, August 1997, p. 10.
[19]The Republic of Sudan,
Humanitarian Aid Commission, “Sudan: Mine Action Programme (SMAP), July
1997, p. 1. In ANNEX I: The HAC Report, Sudan Mine Action Programme, July 1997,
in UN/DHA/MCPU, Assessment Mission Report - Annexes, August 1997.
[21]“Sudan: Country
Profile,” in U.S. Department of State, Hidden Killers: The Global
Landmine Crisis (Washington D.C.:U.S. Department of State, 1998), p.52.
[22]HRW interview with Aleu
Ayieny Aleu, OSIL-Sudan, 15 February 1999.
[23]See Annex G: Areas and
Roads reported mined to the Assessment Team,” in UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan
Assessment Mission Report - Annexes, August 1997.
[24]HRW interview, Aleu Ayieny
Aleu, OSIL-Sudan, 15 February 1999.
[25]Other factors inhibiting
land-delivery of humanitarian relief in southern Sudan include inadequate roads
and ambushes of overland and river transport. See, HRW, Famine in Sudan,
1998, p. 38.
[26]See “Sudan’s
Warring Parties Agree to Stop Using Landmines,” Reuters Nairobi, 11
March 1999. The UN Assessment noted that “GOS sketches of mined areas have
been captured by the SPLA during the winder/spring offensive [but] it should be
noted that maps or records have rarely been kept; what may exist is incomplete
at best.” in UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan Assessment Mission Report, August
1997, p. 12.
[27]OSIL-Sudan/SRRA,
“Landmine Information-Sudan,” p. 5.
[28]UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan
Assessment Mission Report,” August 1997, pp. 2-3.
[29]Annex I - HAC report, Sudan
Mine Action Programme, July 1997 in UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan Assessment Mission Report
- Annexes, August 1997.
[30]Annex J - OSIL, Mine Action
Projects for southern Sudan, 1997/97 in UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan Assessment Mission
Report - Annexes, August 1997.
[31]LM Researcher interview
with Dan Collison, programme officer, Christian Aid, Nairobi, 18 December
1998.
[32]OSIL-Sudan/SRRA,
“Landmine Information-Sudan,” p. 5.
[35]This is according to
OSIL-Sudan/SRRA, “Landmine Information-Sudan,” p. 1. MAG has agreed
to asses OSIL’s mine clearance efforts to date in early 1999 according to
Collinson, CA, 18 December 1998.
[36]LM interview with Aleu
Ayieny Aleu, Director, OSIL-Sudan, 7 October 1998.
[38]See “MAG, Southern
Sudan,” in Handicap International, Mines Advisory Group and Norwegian
People’s Aid, Portfolio of Mine-related Projects, 1998-, 4 December
1998.
[39]HRW interview, Aleu Ayieny
Aleu, OSIL-Sudan, 15 February 1999.
[42]This is according to
OSIL-Sudan/SRRA, “Landmine Information-Sudan,” p. 5.
[43]OSIL-Sudan/SRRA,
“Landmine Information-Sudan,” p. 5.
[44]The Republic of Sudan,
Humanitarian Aid Commission, “Sudan: Mine Action Programme (SMAP), July
1997, in ANNEX I: The HAC Report, Sudan Mine Action Programme, JULY 1997, in
UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan Assessment Mission Report - Annexes, August 1997.
[45]OSIL-Sudan/SRRA,
“Landmine Information-Sudan,” p. 4.
[46]UN/DHA/MCPU, Sudan
Assessment Mission Report, p. 9.
About Us
Our Research Products