Policy

The Republic of Tunisia signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 4 December 1997 and ratified it on 9 July 1999, becoming a State Party on 1 January 2000.

Tunisia has listed 10 laws that it considers implementation measures for the Mine Ban Treaty.[1]

Tunisia last submitted an annual Article 7 transparency report in 2020, covering the period from April 2019 to April 2020.[2]

Tunisia has participated in most meetings of the Mine Ban Treaty, including the Eighteenth Meeting of States Parties, held virtually in November 2020. It did not make any statements.

Production, transfer, stockpile destruction, and retention

Tunisia has never produced or exported antipersonnel mines, but has imported them in the past.[3] Tunisia completed the destruction of 18,259 stockpiled antipersonnel mines in September 2003.[4]

In its initial declaration in July 2000, Tunisia reported retaining 5,000 antipersonnel mines (4,000 PMA-3 and 1,000 PROM-1) for purposes permitted under Article 3 of the Mine Ban Treaty.[5] In its Article 7 report submitted in 2020, Tunisia reported that it retains 4,375 mines for training, and that 30 mines were consumed for training purposes during the reporting period.[6] Tunisia has not specified the type of retained mines that it has destroyed, nor has it reported in detail on the intended purposes and actual uses of retained mines, as agreed by States Parties in 2004.

Use

Since April 2013, new use of improvised mines and other improvised explosive devices (IEDs) by non-state armed groups (NSAGs) has been reported in the Qsrein Wilaya/Kasserine and Gafsa governorates near the Algerian border.[7] Villagers in the area have stated that the mines inhibit their livelihoods and are laid with no known pattern or warnings.[8]

As in the past few years, new casualties caused by victim-activated improvised mines were reported in 2020 and early 2021 in the Jebel Al-Cha’anby area.[9] In 2019, multiple incidents were reported in Gafsa governorate, in southwest Tunisia.[10] The Monitor has been unable to confirm when the improvised mines were laid. Previously, in May 2013, the Ministry of Defense stated that the mines laid in Jebel Al-Cha’anby were homemade mines constructed from a plastic container with a chemical initiator, making detection difficult.[11] A spokesperson said, “the mines that exploded were made of ammonium nitrate fertilizer and flammable materials that can easily explode when exposed to heat.”[12]

In May 2013, a police official told Human Rights Watch (HRW) that casualties in late April 2013 were caused by “artisanal” (or homemade) antipersonnel mines that exploded horizontally. From this description, the mines would appear to be homemade explosive devices initiated by a tripwire, similar to Claymore mines.[13] Tunisia has not reported on the contamination by improvised mines in its annual Article 7 transparency report.