MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Falklands celebrates completion of demining with a symbolic “Reclaim the Beach”
On Saturday 14 November 2020, the Falkland Islands community will be taking part in celebrations to mark the completion of the Islands-wide demining program after 38 years since the end of the 1982 conflict. The Falklands' Government has announced that activities will begin with an event to officially reopen Gypsy Cove/Yorke Bay, the final area of the Falklands to officially be declared mine-free. Read full article
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Disclaimer & comment rulesA filthy Argentine legacy, gone. We are so grateful to the fabulous guys from Zimbabwe for their efforts over the past 11 years. What’s good to see also is the number of Zimbabweans who have decided to settle long-term in the islands with their families.
Oct 24th, 2020 - 09:52 am - Link - Report abuse +2Shame on you, Argentina, for laying those mines in the first place. Shows how little regard you actually do have for our islands and us.
Es culpa de uk el tema de las minas tambien.....pero bueno
Oct 25th, 2020 - 06:53 am - Link - Report abuse -2Yet another Peronist supporter of National Socialism who supports mining of invaded territory...
Oct 25th, 2020 - 08:41 am - Link - Report abuse +1How typical of the deadbeat Argentines who post on Mercopress. Trying to claim the UK was also to blame for laying land mines is ridiculous. Just like saying it’s not their fault they can’t pay their national debt, because someone loaned them the money.
Oct 25th, 2020 - 10:29 am - Link - Report abuse +1Stop trying to blame everyone else for your problems. Otherwise Argentina will always be a third world basket case.
Sans Culotte
Oct 25th, 2020 - 02:40 pm - Link - Report abuse +1Please explain - precisely how is it the UK's fault that Argentina laid thousands of mines indiscriminately?
Also please explain exactly how much Argentina has contributed to clearing up the mess that they made.
TWIMC...
Oct 25th, 2020 - 03:37 pm - Link - Report abuse -2The United Kingdom and Argentina signed in 1997 the Ottawa “Anti-Personell Mine Ban Convention”..., that..., in its article “5” unambiguosly states...:
***“ Article 5...:
- Destruction of anti-personnel mines in mined areas.
1. Each State Party undertakes to destroy or ensure the destruction of all anti-personnel mines in mined areas under its jurisdiction or control, as soon as possible but not later than ten years after the entry into force of this.”***
https://www.apminebanconvention.org/overview-and-convention-text/
In plain Engrish..., it says that the UK did legally obliged itself in 1997..., to destroy all anti-personnel mines in the Malvinas/Falkland Islands..., not later than 2007...
Capisce...?
El Think..., October, 2020
Stink
Oct 25th, 2020 - 04:27 pm - Link - Report abuse +2There are two points to that:
First, militaries are supposed to make and keep maps of minefields, so they can be cleared up afterwards, way too complicated for most Argy units, little better than Boy Scouts with guns.
Second, for many years the Islanders sent the De-miners to clear other parts of the world first, where the mines were much more of a problem.
Argentina’s contribution was, of course, to lay the mines and forget about them, until their own units had to retreat through them not knowing they were there, ouch payback is a bitch.
Better 13 years late than never..., I reckon...
Oct 25th, 2020 - 05:53 pm - Link - Report abuse -2I Think its high time them Kelpers stop whinging about a couple of tonnes explosives left behind by our Argie Armed Farces after that stupid armed conflict in them Islands...
In Continental Europe..., where i happen to be at the moment..., they find and remove about 2,000 tonnes explosives dropped by them Engrish some 77 years ago..., and nobody is whinging...
Europe..., some days ago...:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uZnnj3J4Lw8
Capisce...?
So... Mines deployed and never recorded during the Falklands War aren’t as bad as bombs dropped over 77 years ago during a world war?
Oct 25th, 2020 - 07:19 pm - Link - Report abuse +2Military tech changed over that 60-yeah difference, and so did international law. Argentina is a “modern” country, it should know when it should help remove explosives THEY planted.
A bomb that doesn’t detonate when dropped during Ww2 was common, every so often one of those bombs from the Germans are found in the UK, we just send in a bomb disposal squad and get rid of it...
Mines however are trickier than a simple bomb dropped from a plane, please understand that the trigger mechanisms are much different and deadlier on mines.
Inform yourself..., Nazi Card Anglo Turnip...
Oct 25th, 2020 - 07:37 pm - Link - Report abuse -2More than 80% of the laid mines were properly mapped and all documentation provided to the Brutish Armed Farces... immediately after the conflict...
The missing ~20 percent...?
Well..., shit happens...
It is not correct that the mines weren’t mapped. They were mapped and very accurately. It’s also not true that mine maps weren’t provided to the British authorities. They were.
Oct 25th, 2020 - 08:46 pm - Link - Report abuse +1I’ll never stop complaining that the Argentine government laid those mines on my homeland. It shows they have no regard for the islands. It shows they have no regard for us.
Mr. Jo Bloggs...
Oct 25th, 2020 - 09:04 pm - Link - Report abuse -2And you should never stop complaining that the Argentine Military Junta ordered those mines laid on the land you are occupying...
It showed they had as little regard for you Engrish as for us Argies...
Capisce...?
How can the islanders be “occupying” the islands when they’ve lived there for generations?
Oct 25th, 2020 - 09:23 pm - Link - Report abuse +2Okay I was wrong about the non-recording of the mines, apologies, buts it’s still wrong to plant mines on a set of islands that the planter wishes to control, it just shows all they want is the resources in the sea and not the islands themselves or the people.
There are a lot of projects needed to be done and Britain couldn’t just fork over billions for mine clearance when it had other priorities, but now they are all cleared without the help of Argentina (Apart from the maps).
Capisce....?
Ignorant Nazi Card Anglo Turnip just above...
Oct 25th, 2020 - 09:44 pm - Link - Report abuse -31) It is wrong to plant mines. (Full stop..., capisce...?)
2) You Engrish signed an International Anti-landmine Treaty with a clear, definite deadline...
You did not respect that clear, definite deadline...
Stop making Turnipy excuses...
3) It's documented and on public record at the UN that the Democratic Argentinean Administration that replaced the Argie Military Junta in 1983..., offered..., more than once..., to clear those mines, but that the offer was refused by the Engrish because of obvious political reasons...
Try to inform yourself a little more and embarrass yourself a little less..., laddie...
“The only parts of Argentine territory affected by anti-personnel mines are the Malvinas Islands. ... However, Argentina is prevented from accessing those mines in order to comply with its obligations assumed under the Convention, as that territory, together with the South Georgia Islands and South Sandwich Islands and the surrounding maritime areas, are illegally occupied by the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and are the subject of a sovereignty dispute...despite the reiterated declarations of the United Nations and other regional and international forums, the United Kingdom continues to ignore the calls of the international community to resume bilateral negotiations aimed at finding a peaceful and definitive solution to the sovereignty dispute …”
Oct 26th, 2020 - 03:19 am - Link - Report abuse +3UN Document A/C.1/73/PV.20 dated October 29, 2018.
Very close..., but no cigar..., copper...
Oct 26th, 2020 - 05:51 am - Link - Report abuse -1The official pieces of information that I could gather in this regard are the following:
Oct 26th, 2020 - 10:21 pm - Link - Report abuse 01) The Argentine Army deployed anti-personnel mines as part of the defense system. In 1982 the use of anti-personnel mines was legal. The plans for the distribution of the anti-personnel mines were made in accordance with the international agreements of the time and were handed over to the British Forces at the time of the Argentine surrender.
2) The demining work is expensive, difficult and dangerous even knowing the exact area where they were implanted since the plans indicate the boundaries where the mining was done but they never can, for obvious reasons, identify the location of each of the mines individually. Even if it were, you have to deactivate them one by one.
3) Argentina officially offered to carry out demining work with personnel from the Argentine Army, which was rejected by the Government of the Islands several years from now.
Good to know that the issue is finally settled
Pgerman
Oct 26th, 2020 - 11:20 pm - Link - Report abuse +1You are correct that the minefields were mapped accurately and in accordance with international conventions. However those conventions also call for each individual mine to be plotted, and the mines here were plotted as per convention. There are well established procedures for the laying and plotting of mines and some very simple but effective pieces of equipment that make it relatively easy for properly trained engineers to do the job effectively.
Legal or otherwise- and it was well established in 1982 that the laying of land mines was very soon going to be a thing of the past- the Argentine government demonstrated that they had no regard whatsoever for the islands or us.
Occupied territory.
Oct 26th, 2020 - 11:53 pm - Link - Report abuse -1Jo Bloggs
Oct 27th, 2020 - 01:47 pm - Link - Report abuse -1Honestly, I am not going to enter into controversy about the quality of the information mapped by the Argentine Army because it is information that I do not know.
But let me tell you that, during the war, both the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy used cluster bombs, which are bombs with anti-personnel ammunition only. At the time of the war they were at the verge of legality and, it is my understanding, they are currently prohibited.
With this last paragraph I want to show that both sides fought with into the legality of the moment even with currently prohibited weapons.
As a former Argentine politician, who became president, Bartolome Mitre once said: “the first victim of the war is the truth”
Well...
Oct 27th, 2020 - 02:28 pm - Link - Report abuse -1As a completely partial and biased part in the Malvinas/Falkland issue..., insulted equally by both..., Anglo Mr. Jo Bloggs and Mason Sr. pgerman..., I must say tha...:
The former is right about them minefields being mapped accurately..., with info about the chosen laying pattern and with each individual mine plotted A.P.A.P..., in accordance with international conventions....
And the latter is right about them Brutish Armed Farces having used cluster bombs which..., at the time of the 1982 skirmish..., were at the verge of legality...
As the auld saying goes...:
*** Even blind squirrels finds a nut once in a while”***
Capisce...?
“Cluster munitions are prohibited for those nations that ratified the Convention on Cluster Munitions, adopted in Dublin, Ireland in May 2008. The Convention entered into force and became binding international law upon ratifying states on 1 August 2010, six months after being ratified by 30 states”
Oct 27th, 2020 - 03:27 pm - Link - Report abuse 0So hardly at the 'verge of legality' in 1982
Mind you 'Think' as far as I can see (https://www.clusterconvention.org/the-convention/convention-status/) neither you Russians nor Argentina has signed up to the convention.
It’s a reasonably fair comment, although the cluster munitions convention came more than a decade after the land mine one and the intention of cluster bombs was not to leave dormant “mines” to main people with in the years to come. This “double-edged” element of the weapon was only realised after their production. Land mines were always knowingly planned as a dormant weapon. Although their true purpose was to act as an obstacle, their double-edged dormancy was always clearly understood.
Oct 27th, 2020 - 11:53 pm - Link - Report abuse 0The cluster bombs used here were used for the first time. UK Harriers dropped either 106 or 107 cluster bombs (reports vary). Each had 145 Bomblets with an estimated failure rate of 6.4%.
Argentina also deployed Napalm to the Falklands theatre, apparently also dropped them, except they failed to explode.
Oct 28th, 2020 - 11:22 pm - Link - Report abuse 0And Stink complains about cluster munitions, really?
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