This time on Talking Rotary we talk about landmine removal with Hansjörg Eberle, Founder and Director of Fondation Suisse de Déminage (FSD).
Learn more about their work at:
https://fsd.ch/en/
You will also find a related article in the April 2022 edition of Rotary Magazine.
This time on Talking Rotary we talk about landmine removal with Hansjörg Eberle, Founder and Director of Fondation Suisse de Déminage (FSD).
Learn more about their work at:
https://fsd.ch/en/
You will also find a related article in the April 2022 edition of Rotary Magazine.
Welcome to this episode of Talking Rotary. I'm Peter Tonge, and I'm a member of the Rotary Club of Winnipeg Charleswood.
Mandy Kwasnica:And I am Mandy Kwasnica, Past President and also a member of the Rotary Club of Winnipeg, Charleswood. We are so happy you have joined us here and I are so excited for this new podcast and thankful to our many listeners. Let's start Talking Rotary.
Peter Tonge:Hi, everyone, this is Peter Tonge Welcome to another episode of talking Rotary. I'm here with Hansnd he's from the Rotary Club of Geneva International. Hans, how are you?
Hansjörg Eberle:Yes. Hi, Peter. Very nice to be on the show with you.
Peter Tonge:Nice to meet you. So as perhaps we'll start a little bit and let me know the kinds of things that your Rotary club does?
Hansjörg Eberle:Well, I'm a member of the Rotary Club, Geneva International. That's the only Rotary Club in Geneva, Switzerland, that is English speaking, all the others are French speaking. And this is a very, very active club. We have a lot of national projects, but also international projects in various countries of the world. So it is a it is a fairly active and club that has lots of calls of international staff residing in Geneva. You know, Geneva is a fairly international city. So in the internationals, the expatriates come to Geneva, they tend to come to our club more than the other clubs.
Peter Tonge:Sure. And does that sort of give the club more of a global focus than local or is it really a mix?
Hansjörg Eberle:I think so. I think we have almost as many members as we have nationalities, well, maybe that's a slight exaggeration. But we have members from more than 30 different countries.
Peter Tonge:That's amazing. So the club is officially English. But there's lots of languages happening around the the room I suspect. Interesting. Now, so that my listeners know, I came across the article in the April 2022 edition of Rotary magazine, where you talk about clearing landmines, and we're going to talk about that. But what I wanted to start with hands a little bit was your work with the International Committee of the Red Cross, because I think that's where this all started, right?
Hansjörg Eberle:Yes, that's true. When I was younger, I worked for several years with the International Committee of the Red Cross. And I spent several years in the field in war stricken countries. And mainly, in those days ICRC. The International Committee of the Red Cross, was very much involved in war surgery, helping people survive after being hurt in a conflict. And I spent years also in surgical wall hospitals in Afghanistan in Pakistan. And that's where I saw firsthand that many of the people brought from the battlefields to the hospital, were actually not soldiers or not combattants. They were civilians and most of them were not wounded by bullet wounds. But they were they were wounded or hurt by explosions, and very often by landmines. So, already, in those days, many victims that were brought to the ICRC hospitals, were actually women, children, elderly people, and not at all people who were participating in the, in the fighting as such. Yes. So I thought this was pretty, pretty dramatic. And that's where the idea came up. Can't we do something against the terror of landmines that hurt civilians more than anybody else?
Peter Tonge:Absolutely.Were you working in hospitals because you have a medical background? Or you just happen then find yourself in the middle of this?
Hansjörg Eberle:No, I was an economist by training and I was working there as an administrative coordinator. So you know, I cared for money matters and procurement and local staff issues and vehicles and logistics an d things like that.
Peter Tonge:It must have been, I mean, it will be difficult for anybody to sort of see that damage happening. But to come from something like an economist background, that must have been quite a shock.
Hansjörg Eberle:Yes, absolutely. It was shocking really come from say Switzerland and traveled to this Wall Street in countries and up in a wall surgical hospital and be confirmed. it firsthand with what it means to be hu rt or wounded during a conflict. Yes, indeed, it was shocking.
Peter Tonge:But you really turn that into something positive? Because you started a foundation for the removal of landmines, right?
Hansjörg Eberle:Yes, that's true. I spent about maybe 12-13 years with the International Committee of the Red Cross. And upon leaving, I wanted to keep a little bit still involved in the humanitarian field together, which means we created an association that wanted to fight landmines. Why, because we had all been very impressed by the inability of all the existing organizations to find landmines in those days. About 25 years ago, there were no landmine clearance organizations. And everybody felt that landmine clearance should be done by armies. But the armies of the world declared already, then that's not our job. That's not our job. We were not here to clear agricultural land and clear civilian land. That's not what armies to armies lay mines. And they may also breach minefields to go through. But the clear up after the war is not the job for the army that's
Peter Tonge:Yeah it's kind of seems a shame that they can wash their hands of it. But when you started this work and started the foundation, was that was that pre 1997?
Hansjörg Eberle:Yes, so it was 1997. So it were it was very much the days of Ottawa Convention. And of course, I've heard a lot about that, because the president of the ICRC in those days, he was basically the one who pushed the convention, the first time the idea came up of the Otttawa Convention, it was the President of the International Red Cross that basically brought up the idea. So we were very much involved in this whole work leading up to the Mine Ban Treaty, which was later called Ottawa Convention.
Peter Tonge:Yeah. Now I know a little bit about the Ottawa Convention only because I'm a Canadian, and I was actually living in Ottawa in 1997. So as as peacekeeping nation of Canada, we're quite proud of that. Can you? Can you tell us a little bit about what the convention center?
Hansjörg Eberle:Well, the the urge at the at those times was to basically forbid the use of anti personnel landmines, the feeling was that anti personnel landmines bring a lot of of hardship to civilians, it's unfair, it's militarily not really justified anymore, and landmine should be forbidden. And the convention really, basically brought the states parties together to sign and agree that these countries the signature would not use land mines anymore. But furthermore, they would destroy all land mines. And they would clear all the land affected by land mines. That was the engagement that the state parties took upon signing the convention. And as we have seen, over the last 25 years, most countries of the world have now signed the conventions. And there was a lot of movement going on in the positive sense that anti personnel landmines are not really used anymore by any army in the world. I mean, there are scattered uses by armed groups, but generally, armies of the world don't use landmines anymore. So I think the landmine convention basically has brought a lot of good to the world, even so it also has a lot of limitations.
Peter Tonge:It sounds like that's very good that the countries aren't producing or using landlines anymore, but I get the impression that they didn't live up to the part of the treaty to remove the landmines. Is that fair?
Hansjörg Eberle:Well, that's fair. Yes, some countries have done a lot of work to clean up the landmines. But many countries have clearly been unable to do so. I mean, let's say landmine clearance, humanitarian landmine clearance is mostly done in countries which do not have the means to clear the landmines themselves. And it is done with funds from the rich countries who are willing to fund this operation. So the countries who don't clear up the landmine problem in their own countries, typically, just countries who do not have the means who cannot really afford it. Yeah.
Peter Tonge:So these are, these are these are, are very poor countries that that don't don't have the resources or don't have the means to do that. Same countries that are probably also struggling with their medical systems and all those kinds of things.
Hansjörg Eberle:Yes, and it's typically let's say, countries that emerge after a war. Let's say there is a war, there is a use of landmines and all sorts of explosive devices. So the country is polluted after the war. And then typically humanitarian landmine clearance needs to happen. But typically these countries which just come out of the war, they don't have the means. So this is the part of the international effort to get the country back on its feet that The international help basically provides them the service of helping clear up landmines and unexploded ordnance.
Peter Tonge:Where is humanitarian landmine clearance happening today?
Hansjörg Eberle:It's happening in almost 100 countries in the world, more or less to some degree. But let's say the biggest there are a few countries which concentrate the bulk of the humanitarian demining work to countries like Afghanistan or Angola or you former Yugoslavia. But you have many other countries that are have a problem with landmines and sea clearance.
Peter Tonge:Wow, that's 100 countries that a lot. The you know, and some of them, some of them, of course, you say Africa sin and go are very recognizable. But there's a lot of countries and in my mind, so I'm the article that I read sort of describes it very, very briefly. But how does an organization go about actually removing the landmines? Well,
Hansjörg Eberle:I mean, first of all, you need to get the green light from the country concerned that they let you work. And that's actually a big obstacle, it's often a process that can take a year or two or three years to get in. But once you get the green light, then you also need to have a plan and you need the money. So there is also quite a bit of work involved just to make sure it's financed and you're authorized to do the work. Once Once you have that, typically, we send a few spare handful specialists to those countries who then train recruit and train locals. We don't do that mining locals. And that's the idea that, of course, right from the start to build a local capacity for the day when we are leaving again. So we build up teams that we trained to be the miners, or all the various other functions that is needed in a minefield. And then of course, we have to bring the equipment in. And then we start with a process that is called typically lined release. So we look at all areas considered or deemed to be dangerous. And we try to determine, yeah, dangerous, maybe, but is it possibly a minefield? Or is it not the minefield, can we release the land, because it's actually safe. And there is a whole methodology to go about it. And in the end, of course, there are probably minefields and we need to clear them. And once they clear and start this is pretty intense, and, and time consuming it and then the expensive process, of course. So we spent, we tried to spend a lot of effort on land release on trying just to basically clear land without technical means, right? Once we get to the hard part of really clearing it, well, then it's done in a fairly traditional way with metal detectors, possibly with the use of dogs, possibly with the use of mechanical demining machines. And it's a combination of all these tools that allows us then to clear the land and to basically guarantee that the land is safe for civilian use.
Peter Tonge:That was when you get down to the point of actually looking for landmines using things like metal detectors, that has to be incredibly dangerous work.
Hansjörg Eberle:It is dangerous work, it is absolutely inherent dangerous work. Now we go to great pains and to great lengths to keep our staff safe, by training and by protective equipment, by procedures and so on. But it is a dangerous thing to do. And unfortunately accidents do happen. So when you are a humanitarian landmine clearance organization, and unfortunately, every now and then an accident might still happen.
Peter Tonge:Of course, given given I mean the inherent level of danger. I mean, people are are removing removing bombs, but I was very happy to read that the accidents were were very rare.
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Peter Tonge:Where do you see this going over the next five years? Let's say is this something that's going to be going 50 years into the future or?
Hansjörg Eberle:Well, I think I think generally there will be a lot of work for years to come. Why? Because there are always new wars. But But I think there are still a few trends. One is a positive trend. I think the number of victims of landmines. Since of anti personnel landmines is decreasing every year, ever since the Autobot convention was signed, many states have made an effort to reduce the danger from landmines and the US, is now really down. So that's the good thing. There are less and less victims from landmines. But there is a counter trend, unfortunately, which is not so good. And that is, while the fighters of the world don't use landmines anymore, they use a lot of other things that might explode and harm civilians. So we have seen, for instance, in country where you have the Islamic State , the use of these improvised explosive devices, which actually are just homemade mines, right. They're not called mines, but they function the same way. And so the number of people getting hurt by improvised explosive devices that just act as mines, but are not don't fall under the convention. This use has gone up and the number of victims are just staggering, with how many people get hurt, generally, by explosive remnants of war. Right. So the landmine the landmark part is getting smaller, but the overall part of people getting hurt by explosive remnants of war is still strikingly high.
Peter Tonge:Wow, that chilling phrase, the explosive remnants of war. And I mean, that's what Wow. And it's true, because when I am, I mean, I've never I've never been in a war zone or anything like that. But anything that I saw or read about Afghanistan, we're often talking about these, these improvised explosive devices, right, as you say, with your homemade homemade landmines. Does that does that suggest that the convention needs to be expanded or we just have to accept the part that some improvisation is going to happen during war?
Hansjörg Eberle:I would say with with hindsight, it's clear that the focus of the anti landmine convention was too narrow. Okay. When it was done, it was great to do something. It's anti personnel landmines. But for instance, anti vehicle mines, anti tank mines, all other sorts of mines don't fall under the convention. And, and the perception of what is a danger and what mine, but what t minus two has also changed over the year. 25 years ago, we just had staff that were looking for landmines, but now any deminer is dealing with a wide array of explosive remnants of war. And they would fall under different conventions. There are some for instance, there is a convention that does not allow the use of cluster munitions, which again, functionally to beat like landmines. But now of course, I think it would be a stretch to say we want to do conventions just to cover every single item that can end up as an explosive remnants of war. I think just the fact that they are wars will always lead to a solution with explosive dangers once the wall stops. So I'm afraid the problem is not just going away.
Peter Tonge:No and the example of course, I'm thinking about right now is Ukraine, because technically, these armies aren't supposed to use and maybe aren't using personal landlines, but there's probably some other version of these that are that are being used. Do you have any reports about that? Or I haven't heard a lot.
Hansjörg Eberle:yes, I mean, not firsthand, but I have seen a lot of videos, YouTube and others where clearly you see that land mines are being used, especially anti tank mines, anti vehicle lines. So yeah, clearly both both parties in the conflict seem to use mines. But the most immediate threat for the local population is now not mines. It's just the unexploded ordnance, that these cities have been bombarded heavily. And a lot of these shells, rockets and bombs and missiles have not exploded, they have not functioned properly. And they are still there. This is the most immediate danger for the population. And so our plan is as soon we are in Ukraine, and we have been clearing landmines for the last five years. But the plan is as soon as the fighting would stop. Let's say if there is a ceasefire, then my teams will immediately get involved in moving to the cities and clearing the unexploded ordinance. This is the biggest threat for the for the population.
Peter Tonge:Yeah, I saw a story I guess earlier. Well late last week. Were there the rockets had hit a train station and they were actually on unexploded rocket sticking out of the ground right at the train station.
Hansjörg Eberle:Absolutely. You saw these images a few days ago of the missiles that had come out that hit Kramatorsk dismissal, a container with cluster ammunition that was sprayed at all over the the area, and then descended and created explosions, and lots of civilians were killed this way. These are, these are weapons which should not be used. And these are clearly weapons, which fall under a convention. And no country on the on this planet should be shouldn't be using these weapons. But unfortunately, we see the indiscriminate use of weapons that harm civilians, maybe more than military stuff.
Peter Tonge:So that raises the thought in my mind, do the teams that you work with, have a role to play with investigators when they're investigating things like war crimes and the types of ordinances they find and things like that.
Hansjörg Eberle:Not generally, in some cases, yes, in some cases, tribunals have already asked us to provide evidence or help them with investigations, but it's not typically a job that we are doing. We are humanitarian deminers, and we just work for the benefit of local populations to keep them safe. We usually usually don't take political mandates. We try to avoid taking party and we just try to be technical, a technical service provider for the common good.
Peter Tonge:Right. That's a really good point, right? Because you, if you if you start taking sides, you're not going to get access to the areas you want to do your work.
Hansjörg Eberle:Exactly. And it is also our security. Because we often work in areas which are not completely safe, that a lot of tensions, the fighting has just started. Our own security is our trustworthiness and that everybody in the conflict sees our demands as trustworthy people that are not taking sides that are not making statements, and they're just focused on doing the job. That's the only way to keep our stuff safe.
Peter Tonge:Yeah, that that makes a lot of sense to me, as I think it through. Now, if someone is listening to this podcast, and they want to help, what's the best way of doing that?
Hansjörg Eberle:Well, if they want to help my organization FSD, then of course, they can go on our website and do a donation, I think that's one of the best things they could do. But that's not the only ones. That's not the only one I think also informed providing more information to others about the problem of landmines getting involved in the fight against landmines, there are many different ways how people became become active, to reduce the overall size and the extent of the problems. But very directly, if somebody wants to support our organization, go to fst.ch there is a Donation page, make a donation and the money will end up in, in our in our system to pay the miners and pay equipment and help keep people safe.
Peter Tonge:We we only have one standard question in our podcast. And that is you are involved with with your Rotary club and you're involved in Rotary. There are many organizations you could be spending your time with and giving your energy to Why do you keep coming back to rotary?
Hansjörg Eberle:Why keep why going back to a Rotary? Well, Well, for me, Rotary is more than just about humanitarian ventures. Of course, in Rotary, what I love most are the projects. And I'm very happy to be in an environment where so many clubs do so much of the good work. But Rotary is also about friendship. It's not just about helping others, it's a lot about friendship and meeting people exchanging with others, and having a sound network of people that you like being with and that you have a trust into. I think rotary is also about shared values. So that's very important also. So the concrete the precise action of doing projects in far flung countries that's great and helping the poor and do something for the moment. That's great also, but let's not forget about the values and the friendship.
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Peter Tonge:Very well said. Thank you very much. And we'll stay in touch. This is fascinating work. It's great to see you and very nice to meet you over zoom.
Hansjörg Eberle:Bell Very nice to meet you, Peter. And thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to talk about landmines.
Peter Tonge:It was my My pleasure.
Mandy Kwasnica:Thank you so much for joining us on another great episode of Talking Rotary. We would love to hear from you. Please send us your comments and story ideas and you can share with us easily by sending us an email at feedback at talking rotary.org Let's keep Talking Rotary.