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Table of Contents
Country Reports
GREECE, Landmine Monitor Report 2002

GREECE

Key developments since May 2001: On 19 March 2002, the Greek parliament voted unanimously in favor of ratifying the Mine Ban Treaty. The instrument of ratification will be deposited at the same time as Turkey’s instrument of accession. Greece is believed to hold a stockpile of 1.25 million antipersonnel mines. Greece reported that clearance of all minefields on the Greek-Bulgarian border was completed in December 2001, and included the destruction of 25,000 antipersonnel and antivehicle mines. Illegal immigrants crossing into Greece continue to fall victim to landmines.

MINE BAN POLICY

Greece signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 3 December 1997. On 19 March 2002, the Greek parliament voted unanimously in favor of ratifying the treaty, which was published as Law 2999/2002 in the Official Gazette on 8 April.[1] The final step of depositing the instrument of ratification with the Secretary-General of the United Nations will take place jointly with Turkey, according to an agreement between the foreign ministers of both countries announced on 6 April 2001.[2]

Greece participated, as an observer, in the Third Meeting of States Parties in September 2001 in Managua, Nicaragua, represented by its ambassador to Argentina. A statement was delivered on behalf of the European Union, which includes Greece; it urged all non-party States to adhere to the Mine Ban Treaty as soon as possible, and to maintain high levels of funding for mine action.[3]

On 18-19 October 2001, the Ministry of Defense hosted a NATO Partnership for Peace seminar on regional mine action, attended by representatives of 21 countries and NGOs, including the United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS) and the Landmine Monitor. Greece made a presentation on its ongoing mine clearance activities.

In November 2001, Greece cosponsored and voted in favor of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 56/24M calling for universalization of the Mine Ban Treaty.

Greece participated in the Mine Ban Treaty intersessional Standing Committee meetings in January and May 2002.[4] In May 2002, the Greek representative announced that Parliament had voted unanimously to ratify the Mine Ban Treaty and was ready to do so as soon as arrangements had been made with Turkey for the two countries to deposit jointly the instruments of ratification/accession. Two military officers made presentations on Greece’s stockpile of antipersonnel mines and progress with mine clearance (see later sections).

Greece is party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) and its Amended Protocol II on landmines. An annual report as required by Article 13 of the protocol was submitted on 10 December 2001 to the Third Annual Conference of States Parties to Amended Protocol II.[5] It was identical to the report submitted in March 2001, covering the period 16 October 1999 to 28 February 2001. Greece attended both the Third Annual Conference and the Second CCW Review Conference in December 2001 in Geneva.

The annual report to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on landmine-related matters for 2001 was submitted on 14 December 2001.[6]

STOCKPILING, PRODUCTION, AND TRANSFER

In February 2001, Greek officials described as “too high” the previous estimate of 1.5 million for the country’s stockpile of antipersonnel mines. In March 2002, officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs declined to advance any figure,[7] but a report of a closed session of parliament on 19 March disclosed that Greece has a stockpile of 1.25 million antipersonnel mines.[8]

In May 2002, at the Standing Committee meetings, Major Ioanannis Christogiannis presented new information on Greece’s stockpile of antipersonnel mines, without revealing its total size, although he referred to “big quantities.” He stated that Greece possesses four types of antipersonnel mines: M2 and M16, which are both in stockpiles and deployed in minefields, and the M14 and DM31, which are stockpiled but not deployed. He noted two options for disposal of these mines in line with NATO and EU environmental and safety requirements: via international tender or via the NATO Maintenance and Supply Agency (NAMSA). He noted that no suitable destruction facility exists in Greece at present. The cost of destroying mines both in stockpiles and deployed in minefields was estimated at €6 million (US$5.39 million),[9] although it is not clear how this figure was arrived at. Later, in conversation with the Landmine Monitor, Major Christogiannis agreed that Greece also possesses a fifth type of antipersonnel mine, the ADAM projectile, and that this may pose greater disposal problems as it contains depleted uranium.[10]

Greece has had a moratorium on production and export of antipersonnel mines for a number of years.[11] The closed session of parliament also heard from the Deputy Defense Minister that Greece has imported the Skorpion mine delivery system from Germany or will do so; the report did not make clear which mine(s) would be used with the system, or if new mines would be acquired.[12]

LANDMINE PROBLEM

Greece has created and maintained minefields on the eastern border with Turkey along the river Evros. There are also mined areas dating from the Greek civil war (1947-1949) in the Epirus, Grammos, and Vitsi mountains in northern Greece, and in areas near the border with Bulgaria. At the Standing Committee meetings in May 2002, Major Constantinos Kalatzis stated that “after the end of World War II, the politico-military situation in Balkans forced the Hellenic Army to lay minefields in the borders of the country.” It was clarified after the presentation that this referred only to the border with Bulgaria.[13]

There appears to be no comprehensive report of the mine problem in Greece. A media report in October 2001 gave the fullest description yet, but omitted the minefields on the border with Turkey. It identified the Grammos, Vitsi, Smolikas, Mourgana, and Tomaros mountains as most affected by mines and other munitions during the Greek civil war, and said that “it is still not safe for anyone crossing the slopes of Grammos and other mountains of western Macedonia and Epirus.... In contrast, Mount Belles and the Rhodope range on the Greek-Bulgarian border have been cleared of mines. During the Cold War ... the Greek Army sowed thousands of anti-personnel and anti-vehicle mines from Lake Doirani to Echino, Xanthi.... The Germans used anti-personnel mines widely in Greece to neutralize action by partisans.”[14]

MINE CLEARANCE

In May 2002, Greece reported that demining activities since 1954 have cleared more than 150,000 square kilometers of land and disposed of 250,000 mines and other munitions. In the last two years 3,700 square kilometers have been cleared and 2,210 square kilometers returned to public use. In this time, 16,000 antipersonnel and 14,000 antivehicle mines were disarmed and 18,000 items of unexploded ordnance (UXO) destroyed.[15]

Greece’s Land Minefield Clearance Battalion was formed in 1954. It includes five minesweeper companies, each led by an Engineering officer with eight men.[16] Manual clearance techniques are used, and “canine detection is also being explored.”[17] Mines in minefields are assessed as either having “booby-trap status,” in which case they are destroyed in situ, or as “pick up, carry away” status, in which case they are collected for open burning/open detonation in a sheltered pit.[18]

Bulgaria Border

Clearance near the Bulgarian border started in November 1997, and was completed in 2001.[19] At the October 2001 NATO seminar, a Greek officer claimed that clearance of minefields near the Bulgarian border had just been completed, at an estimated cost of US$1 million.[20] Greek officials later told Landmine Monitor that 16,181 antipersonnel mines and 12,409 antivehicle mines were removed and 38 minefields cleared. Twenty-three of the minefields are being re-checked to ensure their complete safety; the rest are open to public use. The officials said that communities were not affected by mines since they were only on Ministry of Defense land, and no mine awareness programs were carried out as the minefields were well marked and secure.[21]

At the May 2002 Standing Committee meetings, Greece provided somewhat different information regarding clearance on the Bulgarian border. It stated that the operation was completed in December 2001, with the clearance of 25,000 antipersonnel and antivehicle mines, and “hundreds of UXOs,” and at a cost of €5,900,000 (US$5,298,200). This was described as one of the largest and most difficult tasks for the Greek Army, due to the mountainous terrain, dense vegetation, and adverse weather conditions.[22]

Turkey Border

The government maintains that “all minefields along the border with Turkey in the Evros province are clearly defined and marked, well above any standard established by Amended Protocol II and the relevant NATO STANAGs.”[23] Minefields laid by Greece on its border with Turkey have been protected with an extra barbed wire fence, two meters high with illuminating signs, which was erected some three years ago at a cost of €150,000 ($134,700) in order to minimize accidents by illegal migrants. Greece claims, “The result of this program contributed to the reduction of accidents by almost 90%.”[24]

Northwest

Greece has reported on a “huge mine clearance program ... in vast areas of Western Macedonia and Ipiros in northwest Greece, in ‘suspected areas’ containing not only mines but also booby-traps, UXOs and other devices dating from World War II and the 1946-1949 era.” [25] In these areas, there are no properly defined minefields and no maps. Weather conditions for much of the year make progress in clearance slow. In the Grammos and Vitsi mountains alone, the affected areas total over 40,000 hectares.[26] In May 2002, a Greek official said, “All over Hellenic territory and especially at North West, which was an operational theater for almost ten years during WWII, the Hellenic army is conducting clearance of all these old minefields including UXO and booby-traps in order to give all these areas back to free use by the civilians.”[27]

MINE ACTION FUNDING AND ASSISTANCE

In 2001, Greece gave $80,000 to Bosnia and Herzegovina for demining operations.[28]

Personnel in the Greek contingent with KFOR in Kosovo ran mine awareness courses for the local population in 2001. The Multinational Peace Support Operations Training Center near Kilkis in northern Greece was established in 1998 under command of the Hellenic National Defence General Staff. Seminars offered by the Center include the topics of international humanitarian law and mine-related matters.[29]

LANDMINE/UXO CASUALTIES AND SURVIVOR ASSISTANCE

In 2001, ten civilians were killed and four injured in mine incidents; and in March 2002, another three civilians were killed and four injured in two incidents. There is no central register of mine casualties, but incidents continue to be reported in the media. On 21 May 2001, three immigrants from Turkey were killed and one was injured after straying into a minefield.[30] A day later, the bodies of two men evidently killed by landmines were found near the border with Turkey.[31] On 29 September 2001, the dismembered body of a male mine casualty was found by Greek army personnel between Gemisti and Gefyra in the Evros minefields.[32] On 24 December 2001, four immigrants were killed and three were seriously injured in “the worst incident of its sort since late 1999 when five Iraqi Kurds died in one minefield.” The incident occurred early in the morning in the area of Gemisti near the village of Ferres. It was reported that the minefield they entered had been marked and fenced.[33] On 20 March 2002, two immigrants from Turkey were killed and another injured near the border village of Kastanies, 70 kilometers south of Gemisti, after entering a minefield which an army official said, was “clearly marked and even had fluorescent warning signs and a double perimeter fence.”[34] On 28 March, another immigrant was killed and three others were injured after straying into a fenced minefield, again near Gemisti. The casualties were from Algeria, Iraq, and Morocco.[35]

Officially, Greece claims that “there are no mine victims among the Greek population. Few mine casualties suffered during the last years by illegal migrants who tried to cross the border coming from Turkey.... Mine casualties among illegal migrants are suffered from time to time because they are led to the border along river Evros at night and then instructed to ignore any mine fences and markings and walk into the Greek territory.”[36]

On 15 October 2001, two Army mine clearers were killed while defusing a mine near Petritsi, Serres, on the Bulgarian border.[37] According to the Greek military, since 1954, 30 personnel have been killed and 17 more injured in mine/UXO clearance operations.[38]

According to one media report, since 1990, 59 illegal immigrants and three Greek soldiers have been killed by mines in the Evros area on the border with Turkey, and 20 people have been injured.[39] At least 13 immigrants have died in the Evros minefields in the last two years.[40] The NGO Médecins du Monde Greece calculated that 55 people have been killed and 46 seriously wounded since 1994.[41]

Mine casualties are treated in the Alexandroupolis hospital or other major hospitals in northern Greece and then offered “full disabled people programs (including prosthetic services) through the National Health System of Greece (ESY).”[42] This covers “all expenses.”[43]

<GAMBIA | GUYANA>

[1] “Land Mine Ban,” Kathimerini (daily newspaper, English language edition), 22 March 2002.
[2] See Landmine Monitor Report 2001, pp. 828-829.
[3] See the report on Belgium in this edition of the Landmine Monitor.
[4] At the January session, Greece was represented by Brigadier-General Emanuel Krasanakis, Ministry of Defense, and Vassiliki Gounari, from the Greek Permanent Mission to the United Nations in Geneva, and in May by Major Ioanannis Christogiannis and Major Konstantinos Kalatzis, from the Ministry of Defense, and Vassiliki Gounari.
[5] CCW, Amended Protocol II Article 13 report, submitted on 10 December 2001, but dated 27 June 2001.
[6] Report of the Permanent Mission of Greece to the OSCE, submitted on 14 December 2001.
[7] Interview with Ambassador Stephanou, Nikos Kanellos, First Counselor, and Dimitris Skoutas,
Attaché, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 4 March 2002, and subsequent faxes and emails.
[8] Πρακτικα Βουλησ, Ι' Περιοδοσ (Προεδρευομενησ Δημοκρατιασ), Συνοδοσ Β', Συνεδριαση Ρστ', Τρίτη 19 Μαρτίου 2002, (Minutes of the Governmental 1st Period, Presidential Democracy, Second Meeting, Tuesday 19 March 2002).
[9] Exchange rate at 29 April 2002: €1 = US$0.898, used throughout.
[10] Landmine Monitor notes and Presentation by Major Ionannis Christogiannis to the Standing
Committee on Stockpile Destruction, Geneva, 30 May 2002. Greece imported 504 artillery projectiles containing 18,444 ADAM mines from the U.S. in 1988. See Landmine Monitor Report 1999, p. 710.
[11] Apparently, the moratorium on export has been in place since 1994, and on production since 1997.
Greece produced at least one type of antipersonnel mines, a copy of the U.S. M16A2. See Landmine Monitor Report 2001, p. 829, and Landmine Monitor Report 2000, p. 767, for more details on past production, import, and export.
[12] The German AT2 antivehicle mine, which fits the Skorpion system, may not be Mine Ban Treaty-compliant; see report on Germany in Landmine Monitor Report 2001, pp. 699-701. In November 1999, there were reports in Germany that the export of 36,000 AT2 mines to Greece was planned. In February 2001, Greek officials claimed that this export did not take place. See Landmine Monitor Report 2000, p. 647, and Landmine Monitor Report 2001, p. 829.
[13] “Demining operations by Hellenic army,” Presentation by Major Constantinos Kalatzis to the Standing Committee on Mine Clearance, Mine Awareness and Mine Action Technologies, Geneva, 28 May 2002.
[14] Stavros Tzimas, “Live Minefields Cast a Dark Shadow on Peace,” Kathimerini , 22 October 2001.
[15] Presentation by Major Kalatzis to the Standing Committee on Mine Clearance, Geneva, 28 May 2002.
[16] Captain Panagiotis Kafetsellis, “Land Minefield Clearance Presentation,” Workshop on Regionally-focused Mine Action, NATO Partnership for Peace, Athens, 18-19 October 2001; before 1971 the Battalion was named the Land Minefield Clearance Service and Command.
[17] Amended Protocol II Article 13 report, Form F, submitted in March 2001 and on 10 December 2001; Report to the OSCE, 14 December 2001, p. 2.
[18] Presentation by Major Ionannis Christogiannis to the Standing Committee on Stockpile Destruction, Geneva, 30 May 2002.
[19] Amended Protocol II Article 13 report, Form B, submitted in March 2001 and on 10 December 2001.
[20] Captain Kafetsellis, “Land Minefield Clearance Presentation,” 18-19 October 2001.
[21] Interview with Ambassador Stephanou, Nikos Kanellos, First Counselor, and Dimitris Skoutas, Attaché, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 4 March 2002, and subsequent faxes and emails.
[22] Presentation by Major Kalatzis to the Standing Committee on Mine Clearance, 28 May 2002.
[23] Amended Protocol II Article 13 report, Form B, submitted in March 2001 and on 10 December 2001.
[24] Presentation by Major Kalatzis to the Standing Committee on Mine Clearance, 28 May 2002.
[25] Amended Protocol II Article 13 report, submitted in March 2001 and on 10 December 2001, Form B.
[26] Ibid.
[27] Presentation by Major Kalatzis to the Standing Committee on Mine Clearance, 28 May 2002.
[28] Interview with Ambassador Stephanou, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 4 March 2002, and subsequent faxes and emails.
[29] Amended Protocol II Article 13 report, Form F, submitted in March 2001 and on 10 December 2001; Report to the OSCE, 14 December 2001, p. 3; and email from Dimitrios Skoutas, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 26 March 2002.
[30] “Three killed after straying into minefield while crossing Greece-Turkey border,” Associated Press (Athens), 21 May 2001.
[31] “Migrants die in attempt to cross border,” Athens News (weekly English language newspaper), 25 May 2001.
[32] “Man Dies in Mine Blast in Evros Region,” Athens News, 5 October 2001.
[33] “Minefield Kills Four Immigrants,” Kathimerini, 24 December 2001. For details of previous incidents, see Landmine Monitor Report 2001, p. 831.
[34] “Two More Die in Evros Minefields,” Kathimerini, 21 March 2002; “Mines Spell Death for Illegals,” Athens News, 22 March 2002.
[35] “More Bad News,” Athens News Agency, 28 March 2002.
[36] Amended Protocol II Article 13 report, submitted in March 2001 and on 10 December 2001, Form B.
[37] “Land Mine Kills Officers,” Athens News, 19 October 2001; Stavros Tzimas, “Live Minefields Cast a Dark Shadow on Peace,” Kathimerini, 22 October 2001.
[38] Presentation by Major Kalatzis to the Standing Committee on Mine Clearance, 28 May 2002.
[39] “Two More Die in Evros Minefields,” Kathimerini, 21 March 2002.
[40] “Minefield Kills Four Immigrants,” Kathimerini, 24 December 2001; “Mines kill 4 Iraqi migrants, injure 3 at Evros border,” Athens News, 28 December 2001.
[41] Kathy Tzilivakis, “Greece to Scrap Evros Landmines Ahead of Turkey,” Athens News, 30 March 2002. It arrived at those numbers using media reports in one newspaper and the websites of three NGOs, including the ICBL/Landmine Monitor.
[42] Amended Protocol II Article 13 report, Form B, submitted in March 2001 and on 10 December 2001.
[43] Interview with Ambassador Stephanou, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 4 March 2002, and subsequent faxes and emails.