MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
UK-Argentina meet to discuss mine clearance.
Falkland Islands Governor, Howard Pearce, has confirmed that British and Argentine officials met in London on Tuesday and Wednesday to discuss the clearance of land mines in the Falkland Islands.
The Joint Working Party (JWP) for carrying out a feasibility study on the clearance of land mines in the Falkland Islands met for the second time since 2001 in an attempt to push forward the slow progress of any mine clearance ambitions held by the two countries.
One of the many provisions of the 1999 Joint Agreement between Britain and Argentina was that the Argentine Government should pay for a feasibility study into the removal of the 25,000 remaining mines laid by its troops during the 1982 Falklands Conflict. .
Their clearance was halted in 1986 after two military servicemen were injured by mines while on duty. The 117 minefields in the Islands are well-marked, and no civilians have been injured by mines in the 21 years since the Conflict. .
An official statement from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office said this week's meeting had: "Considered the overall aims of the feasibility study, its technical and financial aspects, as well as management issues. In this respect, it appointed new respective project managers. Understandings were reached on a number of measures of a practical nature. It also agreed to perform several tasks in fulfilment of the shared commitment to carry out the study." .
Both Mr Pearce and Councillor Mike Summers said they had no further information on the meeting itself, but Cllr Summers said the biggest bar to mine removal would not be bureaucracy, but technology: "Nobody's anticipating any real movement on de-mining until such time as there's some new technology available for dealing with plastic mines and our position on that has been much the same for many years," he said. .
The JWP is next scheduled to meet in Buenos Aires during the second quarter of 2005.
Sue Gyford (MP) Stanley
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