Team:Edinburgh/mapxmlukraine



Ukraine <![CDATA[Ukraine is affected by landmines and explosive remnants of war (ERW), both unexploded ordnance (UXO) and abandoned explosive ordnance, mostly as a result of heavy fighting between German and Soviet forces in World War II, but also from World War I, the 1917–1921 civil war, and the Cold War. Ministry of Defense engineering forces completed partial clearance of affected areas in the mid-1970s, but demining operations continue to this day. The precise scope of the residual problem is not known, but the ERW contamination is extensive. Ukraine has reported that it disposes of 100,000 ERW annually.

The ERW problem includes World War II ammunition storage areas (ASAs), particularly around the towns of Kerch and Sevastopol where munitions were stored in a horizontal passageway driven into a hill or mountainside known as an “adit.” These are said to have caused some 30 casualties over the past few years and impeded access to land and water in the area. On 27 August 2008, ASAs belonging to the army’s 61st southern operational command in Lozov district in Kharkov region exploded. There has also been a problem from a former Soviet ASA at Novobohdanovka that exploded in 2004 (now cleared), as well as military training areas used by the Soviet Army, said to affect 1km2 of land in Ukraine. Underwater munitions have been found in the Black Sea near Kerch, Odessa, and Sevastopol, including naval mines from World War II.

In 2007, Landmine Monitor identified at least 14 ERW casualties in three incidents and two clearance accidents in Ukraine, which killed five people and injured nine others. Seven casualties were due to tampering and occurred in the Kharkiv region. The other seven casualties were clearance personnel of the MES involved in two accidents near the Novobohdanovka depot. This represented an increase from 10 ERW casualties reported in 2006 (seven people killed and three injured). As there is no comprehensive casualty data collection system in Ukraine it is probable that some casualties go unreported. Scrap metal collection and tampering with ERW were the main causes of incidents.

The total number of mine casualties in Ukraine is not known. From 2000–2007 Landmine Monitor recorded 106 mine/ERW casualties (50 killed and 56 injured). The majority of civilian casualties appear to be due to ERW. In November 2007, Ukraine stated that World War II ERW continued to kill and injure civilians, and that 30 people were killed in Sevastopol and Kerch “in recent years.”

There could be up to 80,000 mine survivors among 300,000 disabled war veterans.

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