Photo Essay: Demining the Dead Zone

The UN is destroying some of the last landmines on EU soil, and making way for new crossing points.

JULY 12, 2005, U.N. BUFFER ZONE, CYPRUS:

MY FIRST MORNING IN NICOSIA. The heat was already oppressive by 8 o’clock in the morning, when I arrived at the headquarters of the United Nations Forces in Cyprus, better known here as UNFICYP. It’s perched on a hilltop, at the old Nicosia airport, which has been part of the buffer zone ever since the 1974 war. The man above on his cell phone is Mick Raine, the United Nations’ demining project manager here since the first controlled detonations on November 18th, 2004. They started with minefields near where they want to open more crossing points between the Greek and Turkish sides of the island. There are many good reasons for demining Cyprus, “but it’s basically a confidence building measure,” Mr. Raine said.

The buffer zone and other parts of the island are riddled with landmines placed by both the Greek and Turkish sides in the 1974 war. Tony Thompson, above, the British contractor hired by the United Nations to carry out the demining, said that the Greek Cypriot National Guard laid a few Greek-made landmines. But the rest of the landmines planted by both sides were American made, including the two M2A4 anti-personnel landmines destroyed that morning. The United Nations is overseeing the demining project, which has been funded by the European Union to the tune of 2.5 million euros (about $3 million U.S. dollars). The two detonations that morning brought the total number of landmines destroyed to 2063. In less than eight months, they had cleared 400,000 square meters, and eight entire minefields. That left just 40 minefields to go inside the buffer zone. Once they finish with those, there’s another 53 minefields outside the buffer zone. (See the update at the end of this story.)

We waited two hours on a treeless mountain ridge to observe this explosion. And another two hours for the second explosion. It takes that long to prepare a controlled detonation. Besides myself, the only other press there was a British documentary film crew. Thompson explained to us that this morning they would be destroying two anti-personnel landmines—not anti-tank landmines—although there were plenty of both on the island. So the explosions wouldn’t be as large as when they destroyed anti-tank landmines. While I was shooting this first blast, I was struck by the eery silence. It was so distant that it took a few seconds for the boom to reach us. Then it roared like thunder off the cliffs across the valley.

The wind was blowing so hard that morning across the sun-baked Mesaoria plain that it drove the smoke swiftly out to sea. Mesaoria is Greek for “between the mountains,” because the plain that divides the island is bound by mountains to the north and south. The U.N. controlled buffer zone—or dead zone—slices across the Mesaoria. The buffer zone is off-limits to all but U.N. personnel and a handful of Greek Cypriot farmers who are allowed to work the land they owned there before 1974. In July, the Mesaoria may look as treeless and arid as the Sahara, but in fact it’s home to random vineyards, livestock, and unrecovered plane crashes from the 1974 war.

We drove down to the blast site. The air still smelled acrid 45 minutes after the second blast. A large crew of Mozambican and Zimbabwean workers were clearing the last bits of twisted steel from the exploded landmines. The fragments were still hot to the touch. When the African workers boarded their bus, they left a few remnants, seen above, of the day’s hard work.

tCr

UPDATE: UNFICYP announced that it had finished clearing 20 of the 48 minefields in the buffer zone on April 5th, 2006, the United Nations International Day for Mine Awareness, which was after tCr had published this story. As of April 5th, 2006, the European Union had contributed 4 million euros to fund the demining effort. UNFICYP estimated that it could clear the remaining 28 minefields inside the buffer zone for an additional 6 million euros, and the 53 minefields in the rest of the island for a further 5 million euros.