WATANI International
22 March 2009
According to some estimates, Egypt has more landmines than any other country in the world. And despite the efforts exerted by the Egyptian government to rid the affected areas of mines, the process is too costly to be entirely undertaken by Egypt and requires the help of the international community.
Landmines are still one of the major obstacles hampering development projects in many parts of Egypt. In WWII and subsequent Egyptian-Israeli wars, no fewer than 22 million landmines were planted over a fifth of the country’s land area, mainly concentrated in the Western Desert, the Sinai peninsula and the eastern coast of the Red Sea.
In addition to the harm they cause to development, landmines have claimed many lives. Since 1982 there have been more than 8,500 casualties, 700 of which were fatalities. It has to be mentioned that many incidents have not been registered. On average, 50 landmine explosions occur in Egypt every year.
Second place
As the country was celebrating International Mine Action Day, Faiza Abul-Naga, Minister of International Cooperation, has admitted that Egypt comes second after Angola with respect to the number of landmines. She says the Western Desert and North Coast still have 19 million landmines, and the Egyptian Army Engineer Corps has been able to remove only three million. Dr Abul-Naga stressed that Italy, Germany and Great Britain had to shoulder the moral and legal responsibility because they were the ones who planted the mines. The initial cost for removing mines, she went on to say, amounts to $250 million.
“The sites that host the largest numbers of mines are rich in terms of natural and water resources, although they remain unable to be used due to the mine threat,” Dr Abul-Naga says. “Egypt is willing to cooperate with international organisations and great powers to remove the landmines. President Hosni Mubarak has launched a national project to rid the country of landmines.”
Egypt has received advanced devices from Italy, and a project to remove mines on the North Coast is due to start soon. In the project’s first phase, 33,000 mines will be removed, and this is expected to pave the way for cultivating large areas with grain. “Egypt is prioritising the national project for removing landmines as it will clear a two-million-feddan area eligible for agriculture,” DR Abul-Naga adds.
Helping the victims
Following the agreement signed by Egypt and the UN on removing landmines, the Executive Secretariat of “Mine Clearance and Developing the Northwest Coast” (MCDNC) was founded. Fathy al-Shazli, head of the MCDNC, said that the latter would provide advanced techniques for removing mines and would cooperate with the Egyptian Army, which will provide 250 elements to remove explosive objects.
“The MCDNC will design activities to help victims and bring domestic and global public attention to the threats posed by landmines,” Dr al-Shazli said of the North Coast project. “The project is expected to focus on providing prosthetic devices to victims and establish income-generating projects. At the same time, the MNDNC will choose a company to produce devices for landmines removal. EGP60 billion will be allocated for the project, which will generate 348,000 job opportunities. The area will have about 1.5 million residents by 2022, and three million feddans will be reclaimed there. As for minerals and natural resources, the area has 4.8 billion barrels of oil reserves and 13.4 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.”
Advanced techniques
Watani contacted Mohieddin Soliman, a specialist in biotechnology at the National Research Centre, who invented a safe and cheap method to deactivate landmines. This entails cultivating certain plants that feed on T.N.T to annul their explosive capacity. Dr Soliman elaborated on his method as follows: “The process of detonating landmines consists of three steps. First, finding the mine… since it is no longer possible to depend on the maps provided by the European countries that planted the mines as ground erosion has caused them to shift location. Researchers have made successful experiments to discover landmines through cultivating certain plants such as tobacco, which turns violet once its roots touch a landmine, Second, piercing the metal frame by injecting a sort of bacteria able to feed on iron and metal. Third, cultivating plants that depend on nitrogen in their growth, since nitrogen is one of the components of T.N.T.”
Yet the relevant question is how to carry out the process of cultivation in landmine areas. Dr Soliman says that seeds will be thrown from aircraft, and once it rains the plants will germinate and the colours of those that contact a mine will change. The sites will thus be located. He adds that the three stages will take no more than two years, and the process is very cheap. Removing one landmine, he said, currently costs $2,000, meaning that Egypt would need almost $20 billion to complete the process. “According to my method, the total cost of the project will cost no more than EGP20 million,” he concluded.
Dr Soliman said the MCDNC had promised to raise funding for the project, but nothing has materialised so far.