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“STOP THE SCOURGE OF LANDMINES” mentioning the U.S. Dept of State was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H2776-H2778 on May 15, 1997.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
STOP THE SCOURGE OF LANDMINES
(Mr. McGOVERN asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks and include extraneous material.)
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I rise this morning to ask my colleagues and the President to support an immediate and complete ban on antipersonnel land mines.
According to the Department of State, a limb or a life is lost every 22 minutes as a result of land mines. Over 5 million land mines are produced annually. Over 50 percent of them are deployed. With only 100,000 land mines being removed each year, villages, fields and paths are turned into death traps. Ninety percent of the victims are civilians. In 70 countries around the world, more than 100 million land mines continue to fight battles that ended months, years and even decades ago.
The years of conflict in Central America have left landmines in the paths of school children. The United States sold over 102,000 land mines to the Salvadoran army. Thousands more were planted by guerrilla forces. I have seen firsthand the damage they have caused to the salvadoran children and young soldiers now maimed for life.
Mr. Speaker, in January I nominated the grassroots based International Campaign to Ban Land Mines for the Nobel Peace Prize because I believe the time has come for the international community to sign a treaty to eliminate this scourge once and for all.
Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record several items related to banning land mines, as follows:
An Open Letter to President Clinton
Dear Mr. President: We understand that you have announced a United States goal of the eventual elimination of antipersonnel landmines. We take this to mean that you support a permanent and total international ban on the production, stockpiling, sale and use of this weapon.
We view such a ban as not only humane, but also militarily responsible.
The rationale for opposing antipersonnel landmines is that they are in a category similar to poison gas; they are hard to control and often have unintended harmful consequences
(sometimes even for those who employ them). In addition, they are insidious in that their indiscriminate effects persist long after hostilities have ceased, continuing to cause casualties among innocent people, especially farmers and children.
We understand that: there are 100 million landmines deployed in the world. Their presence makes normal life impossible in scores of nations. It will take decades of slow, dangerous and painstaking work to remove these mines. The cost in dollars and human lives will be immense. Seventy people will be killed or maimed today, 500 this week, more than 2,000 this month, and more than 26,000 this year, because of landmines.
Given the wide range of weaponry available to military forces today, antipersonnel landmines are not essential. Thus, banning them would not undermine the military effectiveness or safety of our forces, nor those of other nations.
The proposed ban on antipersonnel landmines does not affect antitank mines, nor does it ban such normally command-detonated weapons as Claymore ``mines,'' leaving unimpaired the use of those undeniably militarily useful weapons.
Nor is the ban on antipersonnel landmines a slippery slope that would open the way to efforts to ban additional categories of weapons, since these mines are unique in their indiscriminate, harmful residual potential.
We agree with and endorse these views, and conclude that you as Commander-in-Chief could responsibly take the lead in efforts to achieve a total and permanent international ban on the production, stockpiling, sale and use of antipersonnel landmines. We strongly urge that you do so.
General David Jones (USAF, ret.), former Chairman, Joint
Chiefs of Staff; General John R. Galvin (US Army, ret.), former Supreme Allied Commander, Europe; General
H. Norman Schwarzkopf (US Army, ret.), Commander,
Operation Desert Storm; General William G.T. Tuttle,
Jr. (US Army, ret.), former Commander, US Army Materiel
Command; General Volney F. Warner (US Army, ret.), former Commanding General, US Readiness Command;
General Frederick F.
Woerner, Jr. (US Army, ret.), former Commander-in-
Chief, US Southern Command; Lieutenant General James
Abrahamson (USAF, ret.), former Director, Strategic
Defense Initiative Office; Lieutenant General Henry E.
Emerson (US Army, ret.), former Commander, XVIII
Airborne Corps; Lieutenant General Robert G. Gard, Jr.
(US Army, ret.), former President, National Defense
University President, Monterey Institute of
International Studies; Lieutenant General James F.
Hollingsworth (US Army, ret.) former I Corps (ROK/US
Group); Lieutenant General Harold G. Moore, Jr. (US
Army, ret.), former Commanding General, 7th Infantry
Division; Lieutenant General Dave R. Palmer (US Army, ret.), former Commandant, US Military Academy, West
Point; Lieutenant General DeWitt C. Smith, Jr. (US
Army, ret.), former Commandant, US Army War College;
Vice Admiral Jack Shanahan (USN, ret.), former
Commander, US Second Fleet; and Brigadier General
Douglas Kinnard (US Army, ret.), former Chief of
Military History, US Army.
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Fact Sheet--The U.S. Campaign to Ban Landmines, May 1997
achieving a comprehensive landmines ban: the ottawa process versus the conference on disarmament
Clinton Administration officials have said that they support a ban on antipersonnel landmines, but have indicated that the appropriate diplomatic venue for securing such a ban is at the Geneva-based U.N. Conference on Disarmament, which has been in session since January of this year. Notwithstanding the United States' desire to consider a ban in this forum, the Conference on Disarmament has refused to take up the issue of antipersonnel landmines. There are several reasons why this is the case.
First, the Conference on Disarmament, which operates by consensus, has not agreed upon a ``work program'' for this year. With the exception of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, the CD participants have not agreed to work on anything for the past several years. The most optimistic projection for agreeing on a work program is August, 1997, but the deadlock could easily continue well into next year. The deadlock is attributable, in part, to a fundamental disagreement among states about the balance between considering nuclear disarmament and conventional weapons disarmament. The CD can not address the issue of landmines (or anything else) until the overall work plan has been approved.
Second, even after the work plan has been approved, in order to begin work on a landmines ban the CD would have to appoint a committee and approve a mandate for it. This is a significant hurdle, since China and Russia, both members of the CD, have made it very clear that they do not support a comprehensive ban. And even when there does exist a consensus to begin work in a particular area, the progress moves extremely slowly. For example, the CD agreed to work on a fissile materials ban in March of 1995, and the CD has yet to even establish a committee.
Third, if by some miracle the CD should agree to establish a committee to consider a landmines ban and agree on a mandate for that committee to consider a comprehensive ban, negotiations can go on for many years. It took 16 years to realize the Chemical Weapons Convention, including four solid years of negotiations on the text of the Convention itself. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty was a 23-year proposition: 20 years to establish the terms of the negotiations, and 3 years to negotiate the treaty itself. Such timetables are absolutely unacceptable when dealing with a humanitarian disaster like landmines. Even if the CD were to move at its fastest pace, landmines will claim hundreds of thousands of new victims during its years of negotiations.
The Ottawa process, in contrast, is moving forward at a very brisk pace and has garnered significant international support in the six months since Canadian Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy announced that Ottawa would host a treaty signing for a comprehensive ban on landmine use, production, stockpiling, and export. Over sixty nations (including over half of NATO) have indicated support for the treaty and the Ottawa process. Nine core nations (Germany, Austria, South Africa, the Philippines, Mexico, Switzerland, Belgium, Canada, and Norway) have drafted a ban treaty, and 120 nations met last month to consider verification issues relating to it. In June, pro-ban nations will meet to issue a declaration of support for the Ottawa process and for the Austrian draft treaty. And the core group hopes to finalize the treaty at meetings in Oslo in late September and early October.
The Clinton Administration has defended its decision to pursue a ban at the Conference on Disarmament on the grounds that an international forum which includes opponents of a landmines ban, such as Russia and China, is the only means of bringing them aboard.
The U.S. Campaign to Ban Landmines is concerned about such governments' participation, but believes that the Ottawa process offers the best means of putting pressure on them to eventually support a comprehensive ban. The treaty signing in Ottawa, set for December of this year, will indicate very clearly those governments who are the troublemakers and abusers of this cruel and indiscriminate weapon. The large numbers of countries which will adopt a ban at that time will set an international norm on antipersonnel landmines, and they will help stigmatize and isolate those who refuse to join.
Interestingly, when Secretary of State Albright testified in favor of U.S. ratification of the Chemical Weapons Treaty on April 8, she adopted precisely this argument, stating that American support would serve to pressure other nations to join: ``Over time, I believe that--if the United States joins the CWC--most other countries will, too--but the problem states will never accept a prohibition on chemical weapons if America stays out, keeps them company and gives them cover. We will not have the standing to mobilize our allies to support strong action against violators if we ourselves have refused to join the treaty being violated.''
The U.S. Campaign to Ban Landmines has no principled objection to the Conference on Disarmament. but the very vulture of the Conference is such that negotiations are long and protracted. Such lengthy deliberations, when dealing with weapons (such as chemicals or nuclear warheads) which are not in use is one thing. But when negotiating an end to a weapon which creates 26,000 casualties per year, such a process is a disaster. If it took as long to consummate a ban on landmines as it did to achieve ratification of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, there would be another 5,598,000 victims (assuming current levels of civilian casualties.) This is an unacceptable proposition. There is no reason that the United States's efforts to achieve a ban at the CD should prevent them from joining the Ottawa initiative today.
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January 9, 1997.Mr. Geir Lundestad,Director, The Norwegian Nobel Committee, Drammensveien 19,
0255 Oslo, Norway.
Dear Mr. Lundestad: With this letter, I would like to nominate for consideration for the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and its Coordinator, Ms. Jody Williams.
The ICBL was initiated at the end of 1991 by Ms. Williams for the Vietnam Veterans of American Foundation, Washington, DC, and Medico International, Frankfurt, Germany, and has grown dramatically in size and influence. The ICBL, with its steering committee of nine international organizations and national landmine campaigns, now includes more than 725 non-governmental organizations working in over 40 countries around the world with the common goal of the total elimination of antipersonnel landmines (APMs).
Your consideration of this nomination for 1997 is of particular timeliness: intense negotiations have begun toward the signing of an international treaty to ban APMs at the end of 1997, and Norway will be hosting one of the negotiating sessions in October 1997. The ICBL has been instrumental in bringing about this unprecedentedly rapid change.
When the ICBL began, mostly as an idea in late 1991, scant attention was being paid to the real killers in the world's armed conflicts--antipersonnel landmines and other light weapons. While the world focused on the nuclear threat during the Cold War, tens of millions of landmines were being sown throughout much of the developing world, resulting in global contamination of epidemic proportion. As you surely are aware, thousands of children and adult civilians are being killed and maimed each month by landmines.
With the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the nuclear threat, the ICBL has been able to capture the imagination and energy of hundreds of NGOs around the world and dramatically challenge--and change--decades-old assumptions about the conduct and consequences of armed conflict by focusing international attention on one small weapon that graphically symbolizes the long-term impact of armed conflict: the antipersonnel landmine.
The NGOs that have come together in the ICBL represent a unique coalition effort, which has successfully merged humanitarian and disarmament concerns. Nongovernmental organizations representing a broad spectrum of interests such as human rights, development, refugees, arms control, the environment and emergency relief have, for the first time, worked together in a coordinated effort with one goal in mind: to ban APMs. That the ICBL is a powerful expression of the will of civil society is demonstrated by the truly impressive gains resulting from the work of the ICBL. The Campaign has successfully promoted anti-APL policies and positions at the national, regional and international levels. The Campaign has also called for support of programs to promote and finance landmine awareness, clearance, and eradication worldwide, and for victim assistance.
When the ICBL began its work, no organization or agency was actively campaigning to ban landmines. Its goal, a total ban of antipersonnel landmines, was considered utopian. But through the coordinated work of the ICBL membership in more than 40 countries, the world has seen tremendous change in an unprecedentedly short period of time. From ground zero, we have seen the following movement in the past 4 years: some 50 countries have prohibited exports of APMs, 15 countries have begun or completed destruction of stockpiles, 30 countries have banned or suspended their use, and 20 have announced no production.
In 1996, the UN General Assembly passed by a vote of 156-0, with 10 abstentions, a resolution calling upon states ``to pursue vigorously'' an international treaty banning APMs ``as soon as possible.'' The world now boasts two ``mine-free zones''--Central America, in a joint declaration by its six Foreign Ministers to ban the weapon throughout the region, and the CARICOM states. Additionally, both the OAS and the OAU have passed resolutions calling upon their member states to make their regions mine-free.
This momentum has also brought other change. After pressure from the ICBL, the 1980 Convention on Conventional Weapons
(CCW) was reviewed from 1994-96. The two and a half year process of review of the CCW is widely held to have brought minimal change to the flawed treaty. But through the focus of attention on the process, the pro-ban movement gained tremendous momentum and has moved rapidly beyond the limits of the CCW. It was in the review sessions themselves that the ICBL helped to ignite a true governmental ``pro-ban movement'' by hosting the first meetings of pro-ban states. This series of meetings led the Canadian Government to call for a strategy conference of pro-ban governments in October of last year in Ottawa. The conference was attended by 50 pro-ban states and 24 observer nations.
At the conclusion of the Ottawa conference, Canada's Foreign Minister closed the conference with the dramatic invitation to states to return to Canada in December of 1997 to sign a treaty banning AP mines. The conference chairman, in close cooperation with the ICBL, had prepared an ``Action Plan'' that would lead to that goal. A series of preparatory meetings are now scheduled in 1997 with a target of a ban treaty by the end of the year.
While the Landmine Campaign never saw its goal as utopian, it did not envision such change in so short a period of time. Governments and individuals around the world, including former Secretary General of the United Nations Boutros Boutros Ghali, have recognized that it is the work of the ICBL that has made the difference. One UN official, speaking at the Ottawa Conference, noted that this change has come about because of the original impetus and ongoing coordinated work of the ICBL. He called the coalition the ``single most important and effective exercise by civil society since the Second World War.''
The goal is in sight. There remains a huge amount of work to ensure its fruition. The ICBL, which initiated this movement, will continue to work in close cooperation throughout the year--and beyond--with pro-ban states to rid the world of this indiscriminate weapon.
The ICBL represents a dramatic expression of the will of civil society to change international norms. That is why I nominate Ms. Williams and the International Campaign to Ban Landmines for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997. An award to them of the Peace Prize in this critical year would send a powerful signal that such models for social change are recognized as critical and important as we move into the next century.
Yours respectfully,
James McGovern,Member of Congress.
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