North Macedonia
Mine Ban Policy
Policy
North Macedonia (previously the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) acceded to the Mine Ban Treaty on 9 September 1998, becoming a State Party on 1 March 1999. While it has not enacted new national implementation legislation, it has reported that prohibited activities are covered by existing criminal law.
North Macedonia has attended some meetings of the treaty, most recently the Fourteenth Meeting of States Parties in 2015. North Macedonia did not attend the Third Review Conference in Maputo in June 2014.
It was not present for the vote on UN General Assembly Resolution 73/61 on 5 December 2018, which promoted implementation of the convention.[1]
North Macedonia is party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons and its Amended Protocol II on landmines and Protocol V on explosive remnants of war. It is also party to the convention on Cluster Munitions.
Production, transfer, stockpiling, and retention
North Macedonia has stated that it never produced or exported antipersonnel mines.[2] It completed destruction of its stockpile of 38,921 antipersonnel mines on 20 February 2003, just ahead of the deadline mandated by the treaty. On 10 July 2006, FYR Macedonia destroyed the 4,000 antipersonnel mines that it had been retaining for research and training.[3]
In May 2011, FYR Macedonian army specialists discovered a small stockpile consisting of eight containers containing a total of 1,248 PFM-1S antipersonnel mines during efforts to determine what munitions needed to be destroyed in accordance with FYR Macedonia’s obligations under the Convention on Cluster Munitions. On 10 May 2011, the government of FYR Macedonia adopted Decision No. 48/3 which tasked the Ministry of Defense to destroy the munitions. At the request of the Ministry of Defense, the Geneva Centre for Humanitarian Demining (GICHD) visited the storage site to provide technical assistance in determining the most appropriate method of destruction.[4]
On 10 May 2012, Macedonian army specialists in cooperation with the GICHD completed the destruction of the 1,248 newly discovered mines during destruction activities near Skopje.[5]
[1] “Implementation of the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on Their Destruction,” UNGA Resolution 73/61, 5 December 2018.
[2] Some of the former Yugoslavia’s mine production facilities were located in what is today North Macedonia, but the government states that production had ceased. Fax from Ministry of Defense, 20 April 2004.
[3] For additional details, see, Landmine Monitor Report 2006, p. 508.
[4] Mine Ban Treaty Article 7 Report, Forms A and B, 2012.
[5] Statement by Col. Tomislav Rizeski, Head of Arms Control Centre, Ministry of Defense, Mine Ban Treaty Intersessional Meetings, Geneva, 21 May 2012; and Mine Ban Treaty Implementation Support Unit, “Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia destroys previously unknown stockpiled anti-personnel mines,” Press Release, Geneva and Skopje, 10 May 2012.