Actors & Activities

Last Updated: April 7, 2009

The campaign to ban landmines: The rise of epistemic communities and the Ottawa model

In the early 1990s, several humanitarian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) began to forge links with one another. In 1991, the Asia Watch division of Human Rights Watch and Physicians for Human Rights collaborated to publish Land Mines in Cambodia: The Cowards War.1 Several months later, the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation (now Veterans for America), under  Bobby Muller, collaborated with Medico International, based in Germany, and other humanitarian NGOs that had an interest in banning landmines to form a joint advocacy campaign. In October 1992, Handicap International, Human Rights Watch, Medico International, Mines Advisory Group, Physicians for Human Rights, and the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation formed a steering committee that eventually evolved into the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), headed by the well-known activist, Jody Williams. Approximately 1,000 NGOs from over 60 countries joined the transnational campaign. It would be Jody Williams, Bobby Muller, and then-president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Cornelio Sommaruga, who would later play a significant role in lobbying governments globally to support a ban on landmines.  Go to Civil Society

The Ottawa model

From the outset, ICBL and like-minded states were skeptical about their ability to achieve prohibition under the consensus-driven decision-making process of the United Nations (UN). After a series of review conferences on the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW), backroom meetings between NGOs and government officials were held with the aim of widening and strengthening the landmines ban. Meetings in January and April of 1996 laid the informal foundations that would evolve into the core tenants of the Ottawa Process.

In October 1996, 50 states, including the United States (US), France, and the United Kingdom (UK) participated in the first international strategy conference, Towards a Global Ban on Antipersonnel Mines, in Ottawa. European Union (EU) member states had committed themselves in advance to the full implementation of the results of the CCW review conferences and to support international efforts to ban anti-personnel (AP) mines. Yet, frustrations over discussions that led to ambiguous conclusions and concerns over pro-ban activists threatened to derail the momentum of the Ottawa conference. Although the Ottawa Declaration was signed by the UK and France, Canada ended the conference by offering unprecedented standalone negotiations that would lead to a comprehensive treaty banning landmines. It invited participants to return to Ottawa in December 1997 for a treaty-signing conference. Thus, the so-called Ottawa Process, a fast-track diplomatic initiative, was launched to negotiate in less than 14 months an international convention to ban the use, stockpiling, production, and transfer of AP mines.2 

Meanwhile, disagreement arose over whether the official Conference on Disarmament (CD) in Geneva was a suitable venue for landmine negotiations. Due to the complex partnerships forged by states, some feared that using the CD to address the landmines issue would derail the Ottawa Process, while others (e.g., Australia, France, the UK, Germany, Spain, Finland, and the US) felt that it would take the pressure off of signing the Ottawa Convention. In the end, it did not matter what happened in Geneva. The Ottawa Process had already gathered sufficient diplomatic and political momentum to enable a strong coalition in favor of a ban. To this extent, ICBL and its series of regional conferences around the world were vital to building support for the treaty.

By June 1997, proposals to hold the landmine negotiations at the CD crumbled under the deadlock of non-consensus, clearing the path for the Ottawa Process. Austria, which had been assigned the role of drafting the landmines treaty, held experts meetings in February 1997 to discuss the draft text. Belgium hosted the follow-up international conference, the Brussels International Conference for a Global Ban on Anti-Personnel Landmines, from June 24-27, 1997. The outcome document, the Brussels Declaration, was signed by 97 of the 156 states that attended the conference, and affirmed that the essential elements of a treaty to ban AP mines included a comprehensive ban on the use, stockpiling, production, and transfer of AP mines, the destruction of all stockpiled and cleared AP mines, and international cooperation and assistance in the area of mine clearance in affected countries.3

One month before the Oslo conference, the US had rather unexpectedly pledged its support for the conference and Ottawa Process. The Oslo conference was convened to solidify the final provisions of the treaty in September 1997. During the conference, the US proposed a number of major changes to the Austrian text including: (1) the right to use AP mines in Korea, given its unique security situation; (2) retention of mixed munitions systems that contain anti-tank (AT) mines and self-destructing AP sub-munitions; (3) strengthened verification and compliance provisions; (4) retention of the principle under customary international law to withdraw from a treaty on short notice; and (5) a transition period for delaying entry into force until alternatives to AP landmines became available. At the same time, NGOs mounted pressure on national delegates to ensure that the treaty did not become watered down during the negotiations. As the US was only able to collect a handful of supporters, it withdrew its proposal. In the end, the US offered a few minor modifications to its original demands, and formerly recalcitrant states (e.g., Russia, Japan, Greece, and Australia) offered their support of the treaty.

Transnational civil society networks collaborating with like-minded governments

ICBL is an international network that has played a key role in campaigning for the Mine Ban Convention, in related advocacy, and in promoting immediate and sustainable support for the needs and rights of landmine survivors, as well as demining and mine risk education to safeguard lives and livelihoods in all affected countries.4 ICBL also plays a lead role as an independent mechanism for monitoring implementation of and compliance with the Mine Ban Convention. Its Landmine Monitor Report is one of the primary publications that documents adherence to and implementation of the Convention and the success of efforts to address the AP mine problem.  Go to Democracy & Governance: Civil Society

In 1993, international NGOs such as Handicap International mounted a campaign to lobby the French government to change its policy concerning landmines. This prompted the French to submit officially a request to the UN for a Review Conference of the CCW.5 The CCW Review Conference was held from September 15 to October 13, 1995, and participants discussed ways in which the AP mine protocols could be strengthened. Representatives from 44 countries attended the conference, with a number of NGOs participating as observers. The call for the complete and immediate ban on landmines put forth by the NGOs was supported by a few countries, including Austria, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Mexico, Norway, and Sweden. Nonetheless, progress on strengthening the amendments to Protocol II proved difficult. Fen Hampson, a scholar on the landmines campaign, argues that one of the reasons for the deadlock is that Western defense establishments believed the humanitarian problem was primarily caused by guerilla and non-professional armies indiscriminately using landmines to target civilians. Additionally, they believed that as older AP landmine systems were replaced with more technologically advanced, smart mine systems (e.g., self-destructing or self-neutralizing AP landmines), the risk to civilians and non-combatants would diminish.6

The issue was further taken up in sessions held in January and April 1996. It was only after last-minute negotiations with Pakistan came through that an Amended Protocol II was adopted by consensus on May 3, 1996, and entered into force on December 3, 1998.7 Hubert asserts that in challenging the reliability of the technology of smart mines and highlighting the indiscriminate nature of such high-tech mines, ICBL made support for this approach untenable for influential European governments.8

The role of the United Nations in banning landmines

As the momentum for international support for banning landmines started to build, the UN General Assembly submitted a resolution in 1993 requesting that the secretary-general submit a report on the problems caused by mines and other unexploded ordnances (UXO).9 The resolution noted that some member states had already put in place a moratorium (e.g., the US) or a suspension or delay in landmine-related activity and on the export, transfer, or purchase of AP landmines. The secretary-general had already expressed concern in the year before regarding the effects of landmines in post-conflict peacebuilding in An Agenda for Peace.10 Although the UN has always supported an international treaty to ban landmines, many actors opted to circumvent the UN as a forum to negotiate the treaty out of fear that the universal consensus process would deadlock or derail the campaign.

The use of experts to establish legitimacy

ICRC convened the Montreux Symposium in 1993, bringing together a diverse group of experts, including lawyers, mine clearance experts, surgeons, and campaigners, to examine the different facets of the landmine problem.11 The symposium spurred a number of other studies, including a socio-economic study on the impact of landmines by the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation and research on the global production and trade in landmines by Human Rights Watch and Physicians for Human Rights.12 After much internal debate, ICRC declared that a worldwide ban on AP mines from a humanitarian point of view is the most effective way to deal with the problem (this will be discussed below). Shortly after, the organization put out a publication titled Landmines: A Time for Action, which called for a total ban on the trade and use of AP mines.13

[Back to Top]

Key actors in mine action: The outsiders

The UN has the main responsibility for coordinating mine action globally. The UN Mine Action Service (UNMAS), which is part of the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO), is the focal point within the UN system for all mine-related activities. In this capacity, it is responsible for ensuring a coordinated UN response to landmine contamination. UNMAS is also responsible for setting the International Mine Action Standards (IMAS) used by UN agencies, governments, and NGOs. UNMAS, in consultation with its partners, establishes priorities for assessment missions, facilitates a coherent and constructive dialogue with the donor and international communities on the mine issue, and coordinates the mobilization of resources. It is also responsible for: the development, maintenance, and promotion of technical and safety standards (a responsibility that will be delegated to the UN Childrens Fund (UNICEF) with regard to mine awareness and to the World Health Organization (WHO) with regard to the public health aspect of victim assistance); the collection, analysis, and dissemination of mine-related information, including information on technology; advocacy efforts in support of a global ban on anti-personnel (AP) landmines; and for the management of the Voluntary Trust Fund for Assistance in Mine Clearance (VTF).14

The UN Development Programme (UNDP) is mandated with the responsibility to address the socio-economic consequences of landmine contamination and for supporting national and local capacity building to ensure the elimination of landmines and UXO for the resumption of normal economic activity, reconstruction, and development. UNDP has developed integrated, sustainable national and local mine action programs with the goal of helping communities and countries resume normal socio-economic activities. It works closely with UNMAS to help lay the foundations for the creation of a national mine action authority and the development of local management capacity. UNDP mine action activities stress a multi-sectoral approach, including rural development, community development, and reintegration programs.  Go to Community Reintegration;  Disarmament, Demobilization, Reinsertion and Reintegration; and Psycho-social Recovery: Introduction

In 2007, UNDP provided direct technical assistance to 37 national mine action programs; assessed the humanitarian and development impact of landmines in Angola, Cambodia, and Lebanon; assisted national authorities in coordinating mine action programs; supported countries in meeting their treaty obligations under the Mine Ban Convention; and developed, in collaboration with national partners and stakeholders, a plan for the phased withdraw of UN support in Albania, Jordan, Mauritania, and Yemen.15

The Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD) also has sought to identify a number of specific areas in which mine action can support peacebuilding, including reducing unemployment (particularly among groups that might resort to violence in the absence of alternative livelihoods), coordination and information management, building social capital at local community level, and confidence building at the regional level.16  Go to Employment and Empowerment

More recently, GICHD has begun to develop guidelines to improve the link between mine action and development activities for practitioners and policy makers. These guidelines are aimed at strengthening coordination among mine action and development organizations, aligning mine action with development priorities, ensuring that mine action supports broader development programs (e.g., development plans and poverty reduction efforts), incorporating a more gender-sensitive approach to mine action and development, promoting national ownership, and exploring ways in which mine action can support the prevention and reduction of armed violence.17

The German Initiative to Ban Landmines explicitly notes, Mine action programmes are part of peacebuilding programmes. Beyond victim assis­tance, they should take into consideration the need for fully reintegrating refugees, dis­placed per­sons, and demobilised soldiers. There should be no dis­crimination of ex-sol­diers, particu­larly of victims of mine accidents and other war disabled.18

[Back to Top]

Key actors in mine action: The insiders

In some countries, local actors trained in demining, such as former or current military personnel, conduct mine clearance. There are important implications concerning the ethnic composition of groups working on mine clearance in post-conflict countries, particularly if they are recruited by foreign organizations or agencies. In post-conflict countries that have ethnic cleavages, failure to take this factor into consideration in the recruitment of deminers could cause some individuals to refuse to work together.

If the national military is contracted by the national Mine Action Center (MAC), the agency needs to be aware of how the military is perceived in light of the conflict. Would using the national military to clear landmines help bring the civilian population and the military closer together or would it be counterproductive to peacebuilding initiatives?

The national MAC generally sets the priorities at the national level and coordinates the various national actors working on mine action activities. Local NGOs are considered the implementation partners of MAC and the UN, since they operate under their coordination. 

Mine Action Actors and Responsibilities

International Level
  • UNDPKO: Department responsible for UNMAS; integrates mine action into peacekeeping; Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping chairs Inter-Agency Coordination Group on Mine Action (IACG-MA).
  • UNMAS: Overall policy coordination within and beyond the UN system; provides mine action assistance in humanitarian emergencies; oversees International Mine Action Standards (IMAS); coordinates planning for transfer to national authorities; promotes the United Nations Inter-Agency Mine Action Strategy: 2006-2010.
  • UNDP:Supports development of national and local mine action capacity and promotes coordination between mine action and wider development community at the country level.
  • UNOPS:Service provider in the design and implementation of mine action programs.
  • UNICEF: Supports development and implementation of mine risk education projects in cooperation with the UN and other partners.
  • UNODA: Supports the UN Secretary-General in relation to the Mine Ban Convention and the CCW and promotes the dissemination of annual state reports under the treaties.
  • OCHA: Lead agency for information sharing on the humanitarian impact of landmines and resource mobilization.
  • UNHCR: Addresses the special needs of refugees in mine action.
  • OSAGI:Advances gender equality and empowerment of women in mine action.
  • OHCHR: Advances the human rights aspects of mine action. http://www.ohchr.org/
  • World Bank: Resource mobilization and agenda setting on landmines as an impediment to development.
  • WFP/WHO/FAO: Linkages between mine action and mandates in food, health, and agriculture.
  • Donor states: Funding and in-kind support for mine action.
  • ICRC: Promotes development and implementation of international humanitarian law, victim assistance, and mine risk education.
  • GICHD: Operational assistance in mine action, research, development of IMAS, and support for the Mine Ban Convention process.
  • ICBL: Performs monitoring and advocacy for the Mine Ban Convention and research and production of the Landmine Monitor Report.
  • NGOs: Various NGOs, local and international, are involved in the full range of mine action activities.
  • Commercial companies: Various companies, local and international, are involved in a range of mine action activities, but primarily clearance.
  • Organization of American States:  Undertakes military-to-military training in clearance and stockpile destruction, as well as some other mine action activities.
  • European Union: Funded largely through the European Commission, the EU has shown a commitment to research and development.
State Level
  • Government: Develops, articulates, and implements mine action policies and programs in an accountable, transparent, and cost-effective manner. Drafts and implements necessary domestic legislation.
  • Parliament: Ensures compliance with legal obligations, scrutiny of budgets, projects, etc.
  • Judiciary: Prosecution of offenders under national law.
  • Military: Mine clearance and stockpile destruction.
  • Police: Ensures respect for land ownership following clearance.
  • Border guards: Prevent weapons trafficking, including of landmines.
Private Actors
  • Local authorities: In some countries, they are engaged in the selection of sites for clearance.
  • Communities: Manage the risks from mines or UXO on a daily basis.
  • Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies: Provide national- and local-level mine risk education and support for victim assistance.
  • Media: Place pressure on government decision making and focus on issues such as corruption. Play a key mine risk education role.
  • Civil society: Play an advocacy role and provide assistance to victims, mine risk education, etc.
  • Research institutes: Provide ongoing research, evaluation, and training in mine action.
Source: Alan Bryden, Optimising Mine Action Policies and Practices, in Security Governance in Post-conflict Peacebuilding, ed. Alan Bryden and Heiner Hänggi (Münster: Lit Verlag, 2005).
[Back to Top]

Key pillars of the mine action agenda

In general, mine action comprises five complementary groups of activities:19

(1) Mine risk education (MRE): Activities that seek to reduce the risk of physical injury and death from landmines and UXO in affected communities. They include awareness raising, collection of information on the nature and extent of contamination from the local population (especially for children), promotion of behavioral change (e.g., public information dissemination, education and training, and community mine action liaisons), mobilization of landmine-affected communities to report on dangerous areas, and the identification of landmine survivors and their needs. MRE plays a particularly important role in situations where humanitarian demining cannot be implemented immediately.  

(2) Humanitarian demining (also known as demining): Activities that are emergency-based or development-oriented, which lead to the removal of landmines and ERW hazards. They include technical surveys, mapping, clearance, marking, post-clearance documentation, and the handover of cleared land. These activities may be carried out by different types of organizations (e.g., NGOs, commercial companies, national mine action teams, and military units). Under the Mine Ban Convention, each state party is responsible for destroying or ensuring the destruction of all anti-personnel (AP) mines in mined areas under its jurisdiction or control.

(3) Victim assistance (also known as survivor assistance): Activities that provide aid, relief, comfort, and support to victims (including survivors and their families). They contribute to the reduction of the short-term and long-term medical and psychological implications of victims trauma. When individuals are injured by mines, they require different facilities and services, such as emergency medical care, amputation surgery and post-operative care, physical and psychological rehabilitation, prosthetics, assistance for the blind and mentally disabled, programs that counter prejudice against disabled people, and programs that return victims to economic productivity and social life. There is no universally accepted definition of either victim assistance or mine victim. ICBL20 and the Bad Honnef Framework,21 for example, each define the terms broadly. The lack of clarity and consistency in the use of the terms has created some confusion in implementation and operational roles, which will be discussed further below. 

(4) Advocacy against the use of Anti-Personnel Mines (APM): Refers to public support, recommendations, or positive publicity with the aim of removing or, at a minimum, reducing the risk from and the impact of mines and ERW. One of the key goals of advocacy in this area is to influence the positions and policies of states with respect to international and national law governing mines and ERW.

(5) Stockpile destruction: Refers to the physical destruction and continual reduction of national stockpiles. Under Article 4 of the Mine Ban Convention, the State Party is responsible for destroying or ensuring the destruction of all AP mine stockpiles either owned or under its jurisdiction as soon as possible but no later than four years after the entry into force of the Convention for that State Party. Stockpile destruction plays an important role in confidence building. In contrast to the other four pillars of mine action, the state and, sometimes, commercial companies have carried out the destruction of AP mines. Aside from the Landmine Monitor, NGO involvement in this area has been minimal.



In general, the five pillars of mine action span the range of security, development, and policy-related activities. UN mine action expert Christopher Horwood notes that when the mine action sector began to grow, the relevant UN agencies and bodies had a tendency to recruit only personnel with a military background.22 Mine action had the propensity to adopt organizational structures and practices that borrowed from the military. Therefore, a broader social emphasis and integration between mine action and other post-conflict humanitarian and development initiatives were often overlooked.23

[Back to Top]

Top-down and bottom-up activities

In a typical mine action program, the United Nations supports the development of national mine action structures at three levels: (1) a mine action regulatory and policy institution at the inter-ministerial level; (2) a coordination body that supervises the various mine action operations in consultation with key stakeholders; and (3) operating organizations of non-governmental, commercial, civil defense, police, or military nature.24

In mine-affected states, the government is responsible for mine action activities. It establishes a National Mine Action Authority (NMAA) that is in charge of policies, regulations, and overall management of the national mine action program. The practical and operational implementation of these policies would be up to a Mine Action Center (MAC), which is in charge of coordinating the day-to-day activities of the various mine action organizations operating in the country.

The various actors working on mine action activities come together in the Inter-Agency Coordination Group on Mine Action and in a Steering Committee on Mine Action, which also includes International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC),, The Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD), International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), and various other mine action NGOs. ICRC is the lead organization for mine action within the Red Cross Movement. It is engaged in promoting the universalization and implementation of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) and the Mine Ban Convention, and it is involved in all five pillars of mine action.25 GICHD focuses on the elimination of anti-personnel (AP) mines and the reduction of the humanitarian impact of other landmines and explosive remnants of war through partnerships with governments, inter-governmental organizations, NGOs, and commercial companies that deal with mine action. Its activities support all the pillars of mine action except for medical assistance.26 GICHD has observer status at states parties meetings on the Mine Ban Convention, and since 1999 has hosted the meetings of the standing committees established by the States Parties.27 It manages the development and maintenance of the Information Management System for Mine Action (IMSMA). It supports work on the IMAS and carries out studies aimed at improving the effectiveness and efficiency of mine action.28

[Back to Top]

Donor funding of mine action

Mine action is funded by a small number of donor governments, particularly Canada, Norway, Sweden, the UK, and the US. Donors have contributed to mine action activities either through the UN or bilaterally through support for mine action NGOs or commercial companies, in addition to providing equipment, personnel, training, and investment in research and development. ICBL notes that in 2006, more than $475 million of international funding from 26 countries and the European Commission was donated for mine action activities, which indicates an increase of 27 percent from the amount in donations received in 2005.29


 

The Voluntary Trust Fund for Assistance in Mine Action (VTF), which UNMAS coordinates, has been an inefficient mechanism for channeling funds to programs and is generally disliked by donors because of the high overheads retailed by the UN administration and its slow disbursement of funds to field operations. The UNDP Thematic Trust Fund for Crisis Prevention and Recovery provided mine action funding to 23 countries (totaling $21.5 million) in 2006. In addition, the UN Development Group Iraq Trust Fund received funding from Greece in 2006, the UN Trust Fund for Human Security contributed $3.6 million to mine action in Sudan and Lebanon, and the International Trust Fund for Demining and Mine Victims Assistance received $30.8 million from 15 countries, the European Commission, UNDP, local authorities, government agencies, and private donors in 2006.30 Contributions by mine-affected countries themselves amount to roughly $84.3 million.31 An increase in bilateral funding is aimed at overcoming the bureaucratic bottleneck; however, this method of funding has posed problems for the UNs mine action coordination role.32

1. Asia Watch and Physicians for Human Rights, Land Mines in Cambodia: The Cowards War (New York: Human Rights Watch, September 1991).
2. ICBL, Landmine Monitor Report 1999; Hubert, "The Landmine Ban," 18-19.
3. ICBL, Landmine Monitor Report 1999; Hubert, "The Landmine Ban," 18-19; Maslen, Commentaries on Arms Control, 37-38.
4.GICHD, A Guide to Mine Action, 314.
5. Hampson, Promoting Safety of Peoples, 83.
6. Ibid., 84.
7. Ibid., 84; Maslen, Commentaries on Arms Control, 21-22.
8. Hubert, "The Landmine Ban," 34.
9. United Nations General Assembly Resolution Assistance in Mine Clearance, UN Doc. A/48/49 (1993).
10. Report of the Secretary-General Pursuant to the Statement Adopted by the Summit Meeting of the Security Council on 31 January 1992, An Agenda for Peace: Preventive Diplomacy, Peacemaking and Peace-keeping, UN Doc. A/47/277-S/24111 (17 June 1992).
11. Ibid.; Maslen, Commentaries on Arms Control, 19-20.
12. Shawn Roberts and Jody Williams, After the Guns Fall Silent: The Enduring Legacy of Landmines (Washington: Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation, 1995); Human Rights Watch and Physicians for Human Rights, Landmines: A Deadly Legacy (New York: Human Rights Watch, October 1993).
13. International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Landmines: Time For Action (Geneva: ICRC, 1994), 39.
14. UNMAS, Mine Action and Effective Coordination.
15. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery, Annual Report (New York: UNDP, 2007).
16. GICHD, Guide to Mine Action, 170.
17. For more information, see http://www.gichd.org/operational-assistance-research/linking-mine-action-and-development/what-we-do/guidelines/.
18. German Initiative to Ban Landmines, Mine Action Programs from a Development-Oriented Point of View (The Bad Honnef Framework) (Berlin: German Initiative to Ban Landmines, 1999).
19. See, UNMAS, IMAS 01.10; International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), Executive Summary, in Landmine Monitor Report 2007 (Ottawa: Mines Action Canada, October 2007), 33; Article 5.1 of the 1997 Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production, and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction (Geneva: United Nations, 1997); GICHD, Mine Action: Lessons and Challenges.
20. ICBL defines mine victims as those who, either individually or collectively, have suffered physical, emotional and psychological injury, economic loss or substantial impairment of their fundamental rights through acts or omissions related to mine utilization. ICBL, Landmine Monitor Report 1999, 1.
21. The framework defines mine victims as human beings immediately maimed by a mine, family members and/or dependents of persons with disability or killed by mines, and all human beings affected by the existence of mines including those who, due to threat of mines, could not or cannot pursue their normal activities. German Initiative to Ban Landmines, Bad Honnef Framework.
22. Christopher Horwood, "Ideological and Analytical Foundations of Mine Action: Human Rights and Community Impact," Third World Quarterly 24, no. 5 (2003): 939-54.
23. Ananda Millard, Kristian Berg Harpviken, and Kjell Erling Kjellman, "Risk Removed? Steps Towards Building Trust in Humanitarian Mine Action," Disasters 26, no. 2 (2002): 161-74.
24. ICBL, Landmine Monitor Report 2007, 309.
25. GICHD, Guide to Mine Action, 314.
26. Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD), Overview, http://www.gichd.org/fileadmin/pdf/about_gichd/flyers/GICHD-Flyer-Overview-2007-e.pdf.
27. Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD), Support to Instruments of International Law, http://www.gichd.org/fileadmin/pdf/about_gichd/flyers/GICHD-Flyer-Support-Intl-Law-2007-e.pdf.
28. GICHD, Guide to Mine Action, 314.
29. See Mine Action Funding in ICBL, Landmine Monitor Report 2007.
30. Ibid.
31. Ibid.
32. GICHD, Guide to Mine Action, 314; Bryden, Optimising Mine Action Policies, 163.

The news, reports, and analyses herein are selected due to there relevance to issues of peacebuilding, or their significance to policymakers and practitioners. The content prepared by HPCR International is meant to summarize main points of the current debates and does not necessarily reflect the views of HPCR International or the Program of Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research. In addition, HPCR International and contributing partners are not responsible for the content of external publications and internet sites linked to this portal.