US Hails Kurdistan demining authority
WASHINGTON DC (Kurdistan24) – IKMAA—Iraqi Kurdistan Mine Action Agency—has long worked to clear the Kurdistan Region of mines. Its efforts originally focused on those left behind by the regime of Saddam Hussein and its eight-year long war with Iran.
However, the emergence of the so-called Islamic State raised another, even deadlier, source of the destructive devices, which IKMAA and its partners, including the US, are now addressing.
Solomon Black is the Program Manager for the State Department’s Conventional Weapons Destruction Programs in the Middle East, which is responsible for such demining activities. Last week, Kurdistan 24 spoke with Black.
“IKMAA has distinguished themselves as one of the leading mine action centers,” Black said. It has demonstrated a “level of burden-sharing” and the “will to take responsibility for explosive hazard contamination in their territory that many across the region are still trying to figure out,” he added.
“We applaud IKMAA” for their efforts, and “we look forward to working with them in the years to come to address both the new contamination from ISIS, as well as the legacy contamination” from the Saddam era, Black continued.
The US is the largest donor to conventional weapons destruction activities worldwide, including in Iraq. Since 2003, it has invested nearly $500 million in the demining effort there.
April 4 was International Landmine Awareness Day, and the State Department released its annual report detailing its global destruction efforts, which was the prelude to our conversation with Black.
Black described the situation in Sinjar and the Nineveh Plains, which remain heavily contaminated by IEDs produced by the Islamic State.
“Imagine a village,” Black said, and “inside that village, ISIS sets up a bomb-making factory. Around that bomb-making factory, ISIS sets up booby traps. Then around that village, ISIS sets up land mines,” as he described the very considerable difficulties in clearing areas that have been occupied by the Islamic State.
“It’s going to take a serious amount of time to address that,” he explained— “years to come.”
“The United Nations is currently conducting a large survey of all areas liberated from ISIS,” which “will hopefully be completed by the end of the year,” he explained.
Because the Islamic State has left so many IEDs over such a wide area, demining authorities must prioritize where they focus their clearance efforts.
“The US coordinates closely with IKMAA and their counterpart in Baghdad, the Directorate of Mine Action, to identify areas with the greatest needs,” Black explained.
Priority goes to areas in which other preparations are being made to restore them to a condition suitable for the return of the inhabitants, who are now living in camps. According to UN figures released last month, 1.7 million Iraqis remain displaced, of which the Kurdistan Region hosts over 1.2 million, along with 273,000 Syrian refugees.