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The
Nobel Peace Prize for 1997
The Nobel Lecture given by The Nobel Peace Prize Laureate 1997
- International Campaign to Ban Landmines, by Rae McGrath (Oslo,
December 10, 1997)
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Copyright © The Nobel Foundation, Stockholm, 1997.
Your Majesties, Members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Almost exactly fifteen years ago somewhere close to the Thai-Cambodian
border, Tun Channareth was lying helpless in a minefield, both legs
shattered by an anti-personnel mine. As his terrified friend looked
on he took an axe and attempted, in his own words, “...to
cut off the dead weight of my legs”. Horrified by the sight
his companion snatched away the axe and dragged him from the minefield.
Mercifully unconscious through loss of blood for most of the hours
that followed he awoke to find his legs amputated. Today he lives
with his wife and six children in Cambodia, he designs wheelchairs
and works with disabled children, encouraging them to live full
and active lives. Tun Channareth is one of tens of thousands of
campaigners from more than sixty countries who work in a worldwide
partnership; the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (the ICBL).
Reth was chosen to accept this prestigious award because he exemplifies
the experience, commitment and activism which form the roots of
this campaign, a coalition of more than 1100 non-governmental organisations.
We were, and still are, driven, not by the wish to ban a weapon
of war, but to bring to a halt the unacceptable impact of the anti-personnel
mine on people.
It is the indiscriminate nature of the anti-personnel landmine,
the fact that it is triggered by its victim, that it remains active
indefinitely after conflicts cease, which make it different than
any other weapon. However, it was also its' impact over such a wide
area of human activity which singled it out - and made the birth
of the ICBL inevitable. How could organisations committed to work
with communities affected by landmines fail to recognise the fact
which governments and the manufacturers had chosen to ignore - that
the situation was already out of control and extending further beyond
our capacity to respond with every new conflict? And armed with
the facts about this weapon, how could civil society fail to respond?
Clearing landmines while others were being planted, manufactured
and traded was no solution. Amputating limbs and providing prostheses
for one survivor while another bled to death unaided was no solution.
Why provide improved seeds for farmers whose fields were mined,
or vaccinate animals which graze in minefields? We saw a world where
peace had few advantages over war. The circle of manufacture, supply
and use had to be broken. The answer was a ban - and so the campaign
was born.
We called for a global ban on use, production, transfer and stockpiling
and demanded adequate resources for demining and victim assistance.
That call remains unchanged - a demand by civil society that governments
throughout the world could not ignore.
In Ottawa last week more than 120 nations signed a treaty banning
anti-personnel mines - a treaty which overcame the slow progress
which had become the hallmark of international legislation. We applaud
those governments who initiated and drove this process which began
as a direct result of civil activism expressed through the work
of the ICBL. The campaign, because of its diversity of experience
and direct links to the minefields of the world, has been able to
support the Ottawa process from the beginning; providing the humanitarian
and technical data which underpins the urgent need to ban anti-personnel
mines. We have praised the comprehensive nature of the treaty. But
at the same time a key role of the campaign has been to identify
and challenge areas of concern in the treaty since these could cost
lives and deny land. For example; the treaty excludes “..mines
designed to be detonated by the presence, proximity or contact of
a vehicle as opposed to a person, that are equipped with anti-handling
devices.......” from definition as an anti-personnel mine.
Anti-handling devices are designed to kill or maim deminers. The
Ottawa treaty rightly calls for signatories to assist and fund humanitarian
mine clearance initiatives. It is, therefore, contradictory and
against the spirit in which this treaty was conceived to include
a specific exemption for a device which is designed to make that
task more dangerous. Delegates at the Oslo conference which finalised
the text of the treaty established for the diplomatic record that
landmines equipped with devices which would explode as a result
of an innocent or unintentional act were considered anti-personnel
mines and therefore banned, the campaign will hold them accountable
if this diplomatic understanding is not honoured. Allow me to put
this in perspective.
Less than three weeks ago, on November 21st at ten-thirty in the
morning, David Licumbi, an experienced humanitarian deminer, was
working on the Lucusse Road in Moxico Province, Eastern Angola.
David died when an anti-tank mine exploded less than a metre from
him. He did nothing wrong, he broke no rules - a magnetic-influence
anti-handling device fitted to the mine responded to the presence
of David's mine detector. The implications of this incident go far
beyond the tragic death of a deminer, work on this key road has
ceased and this will threaten the resettlement of displaced Angolans
and damage community confidence in the peace process. How can we
ask these brave men and women to continue their work when their
very detection devices may become the instrument of their deaths?
And so we view the Ottawa Treaty as a first and valuable step, a
milestone in a battle to rid this world of anti-personnel mines.
While these weapons remain in the world's armouries there is no
nation immune from their effects - they can be delivered by aeroplane
or missile and once they are deployed there is no magic technology
to remove them - it would take no more than a few days to turn this
country, Norway, into one of the world's worst-mined nations. It
would take years to make it safe again and during those years Norwegians
would become so familiar with the sight of limbless, blind and scarred
compatriots that they would no longer turn their heads to look.
Norwegians would become deminers of their own land and learn too
late, as the people of Bosnia today are learning, that there is
no immunity from the impact of this weapon.
To sign the Treaty is not enough, forty countries must ratify this
treaty before its entry into force and no nation which seeks to
reverse the damage done to our world by this weapon can justify
any delay in ratification.
The International Campaign will do everything in its power in the
coming months to achieve an legally binding ban by December 1998.
To this end we, as Nobel Peace Prize Laureates - issue a challenge
directly to the Heads of State of each signatory country - make
sure that your country is among the first forty nations who ratify
the Ottawa Treaty.
What of those nations which have failed to sign the Treaty or those
which have not even attended the preparatory conferences? It would
be easy to focus totally on China, the United States and Russia,
nations whose stubborn refusal to put humanitarian concern above
ill-judged military policy is inconsistent with their status as
UN Security Council members and major regional powers. But what
of those countries like South and North Korea, India, Pakistan,
Israel and Syria whose, often valid, concern for their border defences
blinds them to the damaging nature of the anti-personnel mine? What
of Egypt, a country which is itself blighted by landmines emplaced
decades ago, which argues it needs anti-personnel mines to deter
smugglers from crossing its borders? We have heard much about the
South Korean minefields. South Korea and the US government argue
that the Demilitarised Zone minefields are of such importance they
wish to make them exempt from any landmine ban. The ICBL does not
accept the defensive utility of and necessity for the retention
of those minefields.
Freedom is so often the justification for war. But where is the
sense in fighting for the freedom of a people employing a weapon
which will deny those same people, in peacetime, freedom to live
without fear, freedom to farm their land, freedom merely to walk
in safety from place to place - deny them the freedom to let their
children play without being torn apart by a landmine? That is no
freedom.
All those States who have failed to sign this treaty have failed
humanity - size, power and economy are irrelevant - they are intransigent
and uncaring in the face of compelling humanitarian, economic and
environmental evidence that anti-personnel mines should be banned.
We are determined that the Ottawa Treaty will become a global legal
instrument applicable to all states and will leave no avenues of
action unexplored to achieve that aim. Together we have achieved
so much but our progress must be measured against an obscene reality
- that there are warehouses overflowing with anti-personnel mines
throughout the world. These weapons must be destroyed - their mere
presence is a threat since, while they remain in store, any country
which goes to war will be tempted to deploy them. The destruction
of stockpiles removes that possibility.
The Campaign will focus particular attention on those nations which
have not signed the Ottawa Treaty, especially those which manufacture,
export or use anti-personnel mines. It is our contention that the
treaty establishes a norm which is equally applicable to non-signatories,
that the use of anti-personnel mines by any force, from any nation
including guerilla armies, is no longer acceptable.
And here we would offer another challenge to signatory states; illustrate
your commitment by destroying stockpiles of anti-personnel mines
and enact domestic legislation outlawing the design, manufacture,
trading and use of this weapon immediately - do not wait for the
treaty to enter into force, do it now.
Arms manufacturers have driven and encouraged the trade in landmines
and profited from the misery of millions - we intend to hold governments
to their treaty obligations which require them to stop all production
of anti-personnel mines and their components. Who can forget the
competition to ship millions of mines to Iran and Iraq, mainly from
Italy, and the role of countries like Singapore in providing a “legal”
conduit for those mines to reach their destination? Happily the
Italian government has enacted legislation which has driven the
worst offenders out of the business of landmine manufacture, a process
initiated and supported by the ICBL - but our business with those
companies is not concluded until we are assured that they have not
merely transferred their production overseas. The supply of components
implies no lesser culpability than primary manufacture. We should
remember the lesson learned by the people of Sweden, who believed
their country to have had no involvement in the export of landmines
during the Iran-Iraq conflict. They were wrong -because the explosive
which filled millions of Italian mines came from Sweden. And so
we can be sure that today as a result of that trade cooperation,
many years after hostilities between those two countries ended,
a Kurdish farmer or a Mother searching for firewood or a child playing
in the snow will be killed or maimed by a mine like this (holds
up VS-69).
This is not an attempt to vilify selected nations - it is a plea
for civil society to demand transparency from the arms industry,
the military and from their governments. It is no moral excuse to
wring your hands and cry "but I never knew" - if
you never asked to know.
We have this target in view - that no soldier will carry an anti-personnel
mine into battle. That no government or company anywhere in this
world will make anti-personnel mines nor any weapon, by any name
or in any shape, that is, by effect, an anti-personnel mine.
We will investigate all possibilities to achieve that target. Member
organisations of the ICBL will continue examining the potential
for mounting legal actions which may result in the payment of damages
to mine victims, their families and mine-affected communities. Neither
will we neglect the environmental impact of landmines. If a company
can be held legally liable for an oil-spill we must ask why similar
sanctions should not apply to arms manufacturers who have supplied
landmines.
A small girl once explained patiently to me the moments following
her crippling by a mine: "We were playing a game by the
railroad track on the hillside, we had to hop up the hill, we each
took our turn. I was hopping and then there was a flash - a very
bright light - and I thought there was a bang but my ears hurt and
I could not tell. It was frightening and my friends ran away and
I ran after them. But I fell over which made me more scared and
I got up very quickly and then fell over.....and I slipped down
the hill and I could hear my friends shouting and there was a strange
smell and I started crying, I wanted my Mother because I couldn't
get up and run away or even sit up properly. Then I saw that something
was wrong with my leg - it was twisted and very dirty and I saw
it was bleeding - then I forget. When I woke up my face was wet,
my mother was holding me very close and her tears were dropping
on me. She said "Don't worry - you will be alright", I
hurt a lot but I was happy then".
Anti-personnel mines do not only sever limbs, they can break the
human spirit. We talk not of mine victims, but of survivors - but
to survive such trauma requires support, encouragement and love.
That responsibility must not be left to the survivors family and
friends, who are often struggling themselves against poverty and
the damaging effects of conflict, but to a greater family - the
human family. In most mine affected countries we, the international
community, must offer more than the surgeon's knife and prostheses
as support to those who survive the blast of a landmine - in some
countries even that basic level of care may not be available. This
is not support - it is little more than first aid. In the same way
as the Ottawa Treaty is only the first step towards a global ban,
so prostheses should be seen as the first stage in the support process
for the victim of a mine blast. That is not the case today, and
the reason for this lack of response is evident and shames us all
- we simply do not care enough. This is a responsibility which the
ICBL places high on its action agenda. We must have respect for
the rights of those who fall victim to landmines, most importantly
their right to control their own lives and their right to be heard.
Through our member organisations, especially those who deal directly
with landmine survivors and their families, we will seek effective
and innovative ways to ensure support for their treatment to match
the scale of the problem. That support must incorporate social and
economic integration. The ICBL expects governments to join us in
this attempt to redress the wrong suffered by the victims of mine
explosions.
There are tens of millions of landmines around our world - no-one
knows how many and it simply does not matter. What matters is that
we eradicate them. There is a popular myth that mine clearance costs
too much - the ICBL does not accept that is true and, faced with
the obscenity of the effects of the anti-personnel mine, it would
be difficult to understand what scale of measurement could be used
to make such a calculation. The problem is that most funding for
mine clearance is allocated from aid and development budgets and,
we would agree, those sources are inadequate to the task and are
already struggling to meet their commitments in other sectors, often
exacerbated by the peripheral impact of landmines especially in
the fields of health, agriculture and resettlement. It follows,
therefore, that other sources of funding must be identified. There
should be no misunderstanding - the cost of global eradication of
landmines will be billions of dollars, assuming that sustainable
methodologies are employed and emphasis is placed on developing
an indigenous capacity in each affected country.
We must afford it, we cannot talk of having concern for the global
environment and yet leave future generations a blighted world with
land made unusable by this deadly military garbage. We need to look
for relevant funding sources which can meet the requirements of
the task we face. It is worth making a comparison which illustrates
the priorities which must be challenged before global mine eradication
becomes an achievable objective.
The tens of millions of dollars spent annually on mine clearance
pale in comparison to the hundreds of billions spent on the military.
In 1995 alone the military expenditure by European Union nations
was more than US$166 billion - in the same year world military expenditure
was over US$695 billion. Based on these figures it would seem that
the military, who are responsible for the laying of landmines, are
a polluter who can afford to pay the price of clearance.
But it is not merely a matter of making funds available, it is vital
that they are expended on relevant, effective and integrated response.
Mine action is a sector of development - that this approach works
on a national level is well illustrated in Afghanistan.
To achieve these aims the campaign will continue to expand our activities
and develop new national campaigns, particularly in countries which
have not signed the treaty. We open our arms to new members who
support our aims, particularly those from mined countries and from
mine-producing states.
Your Majesties, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen we are greatly
honoured by the award of the Nobel Peace Prize and are proud but
humbled to share this award with previous Laureates such as Nelson
Mandela, Aung San Suu Kyi, Desmond Tutu, Bishop Belo and José
Ramos Horta who have given so much in the service of peace. We would
also like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to a fellow nominee
and champion of civil action, Wei Jingsheng, and wish him well in
the hope that he can one day return to his home in happier times.
The International Campaign to Ban Landmines dedicates this award
to all victims of landmines and their families, to those communities
who struggle to exist surrounded by minefields and to humanitarian
deminers. It is the wish of every reasonable human being to leave
this world a better place for their having lived, it is a wish we
rarely can hope to achieve. By eradicating landmines we can leave
future generations a better and safer world in which to live - it
is possible; we should grasp that opportunity.
Thank you.
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