RESOLUTION B3-1744/92

Resolution on the injuries and loss of life caused by mines

The European Parliament,

A. having regard to the injuries and loss of life caused by mines in Afghanistan, Angola, Cambodia, Iraqi Kurdistan, Mozambique, Laos and Somalia, in certain parts of Central America and, more and more frequently, in Bosnia-Herzegovina, and whereas these mines are designed to mutilate rather than kill, their commonest victims being civilians, including thousands of children,

B. whereas, according to the non-governmental organizations involved in combating this scourge, some 10 to 12 million mines remain to be cleared in Afghanistan, a process which will take several thousand years at the present rate,

C. whereas in Cambodia 36 000 people have already lost limbs in accidents involving mines,

D. shocked by the role played by the Member States in the manufacture and sale of these mines,

E. concerned that mine clearance work is being delayed by the inability of the Member States and other members of the United Nations to provide the financial resources required,

1. Calls on all those Member States which have not yet done so to ratify the United Nations Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be Excessively Injurious or to Have Indiscriminate Effects;

2. Urges EPC to extend this Convention to cover domestic conflicts;

3. Calls, as a matter of urgency, for a five-year European moratorium on the sale, transfer and export of anti-personnel mines and all associated military assistance, with the exception of operations designed to minimize risks or clear and destroy mines;

4. Stresses the need to guarantee the special military units and the NGOs involved in mine clearance the resources they need to continue their work and to increase those resources as fresh qualified personnel become available;

5. Calls on the Member States which are members of the UN Security Council to raise the issue of how to ensure that mine clearance is regarded as a problem of the utmost urgency;

6. Stresses that the presence of large numbers of mines makes economic recovery impossible, particularly in predominantly agricultural or rural societies;

7. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, EPC, the Commission, the members of the UN Security Council and the UN Secretary-General.