Cape Verde signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 4 December
1997, ratified on 14 May 2001, and the treaty entered into force for the country
on 1 November 2001. It is not known if national implementation measures are in
place, as Cape Verde has not yet submitted an Article 7 transparency report. In
March 2003, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs told Landmine Monitor that “the
necessary steps will soon be taken” to submit the
report.[1] Cape Verde did not
attend any Mine Ban Treaty-related meetings in 2002 or the first half of 2003,
but on 22 November 2002 it voted in favor of UN General Assembly Resolution
57/74, promoting universalization and implementation of the treaty. Cape Verde
is a member of the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) and its Amended
Protocol II, but it did not attend CCW meetings in December 2002. In March
2003, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official confirmed that Cape Verde does not
maintain a stockpile of antipersonnel mines and is not mine affected,
“since this weapon simply does not exist on Cape Verdian
territory.”[2]