TIRANA TIMES
TIRANA, July 12 – The Delegation of the European Union to Albania, in cooperation with UNDP Albania and supported by the Albanian Mine Action Executive (AMAE), held the EU Mine Action Visibility Day last week inviting senior representatives from the Delegation of the European Union to Albania, UNDP Albania and the Albanian Government, partners and donors of the Albanian Mine Action Program (AMAP), implementing local and international non-governmental organizations, mine/unexploded ordinance survivors, etc.
The conference highlighted the impact of the EU support to the achievement of AMAP’s main goal and objectives: the completion of clearance operations, provision of care and assistance to the mine survivors in Albania and Mine Risk Education. The EU has supported the AMAP since its beginning and financial assistance has amounted to 5.07 million euros.
Such intervention directly contributed to the improvement of people’s lives and safety in the former mine-affected villages of Northeast Albania. In addition, it contributed to the fulfillment of Albania’s obligations deriving from the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention.
Awareness materials and displays featuring Mine Action activities were displayed throughout the event.
Last October Albania reported the country was free of all known mines and unexploded ordnance.
many of the explosives were planted inside Albanian territory by neighboring Serbia during the Kosovo war in 1998-1999 and Macedonia in 2001, as those countries battled ethnic Albanian insurgencies. Others were planted by weapons smugglers.
Over the past decade mines and unexploded ordnance have killed 34 Albanians, a third of them children. And 238 people have been wounded.
