Old land-mines rife in Chile
2001-05-25 00:30
Santiago, Chile - Like many Chileans, Gustavo
Soto always thought the snowcapped Andean mountains that tower
ominously over the eastern fringe of this long, narrow country
were the most peaceful place on earth.
But a nightmarish experience two years ago taught him that
not only the majestic Andes but patches of the Atacama Desert
in the north and the picturesque islands of Patagonia in the
south are riddled with one of the world's cruelest weapons.
During a roadside stop on a remote mountain pass in
northern Chile, Soto spotted a green plastic disc "a little
bigger than a wristwatch" that he mistook for a lid from a
water container. He carelessly picked it up and plunked it onto
the dashboard of the pickup truck he was traveling in.
As he and his friends set off again, the truck lurched into
gear and the "lid" began to slide. Soto instinctively slammed
his hands down on it.
"The truck just tore apart. The floor blew off, the roof was ripped right through. All I felt was the explosion, but I realised right away that I had lost my hands," Soto said, holding up the two knobby stumps that prevent him from pulling on his own socks or taking a bus by himself.
Designed to maim
Police said the "lid" turned out to be a US-built M14
anti-personnel land-mine, one of 300 000 the United States
exported to Chile in the early years of Gen Augusto Pinochet's
1973-1990 military dictatorship, according to US Defence
Department information cited by Human Rights Watch.
Triggered by downward pressure, the M14 is specially designed to maim but not kill, a strategy military analysts say is based on the premise that a wounded soldier is more of a
liability to the enemy than a dead one.
Yet Pinochet's anti-Communist regime did not deploy the weapon with an internal enemy in mind, unlike other land mine-infested nations like Colombia and Nicaragua.
To protect frontier zones
Between 1974 and 1978, Chile's army and navy dotted the sparsely populated, rugged terrain along its borders with Peru, Bolivia and Argentina with 293 minefields containing between 250 000 and 1 million anti-personnel and anti-tank land-mines.
Relations with neighbouring countries were at an all-time low and Pinochet wanted to protect frontier zones. More than 20 years later, those conflicts are long forgotten, but the land-mines remain, a rueful reminder of Chile's murky military past.
"Chile today is very different from then. Even at the time the weapon was used it was part of Chile's defensive policy," said Undersecretary of War Gabriel Gaspar.
Gaspar insists the minefields are still safely fenced-off
and marked, posing a danger only to daredevils. "If someone is
looking for high risk, they will find it," he said.
But Soto, one of 26 reported cases of civilian land-mine casualties in Chile, takes offence at the government's lack of concern and is suing for about US$800 000, the estimated cost of prostheses for his hands and the medical costs after the accident, in which he also lost an eye and suffered burns.
"Nothing but promises."
"The state is supposed to be responsible for what happens to its citizens," he said. Despite Defence Minister Mario Fernandez's personal promise to settle his case out of court, a disillusioned Soto says he received "nothing but promises."
Other land-mine survivors feel similarly abandoned. Elias Moscoso, a 15-year-old Aymara Indian from a village in the
Andean Highlands, lost part of his right hand in 1996 after
picking up a shiny object in the middle of the road. His
lawsuit against the state was thrown out of court.
Government secrecy surrounding the land-mine problem - it
says the information is "reserved" - means nobody really knows
exactly how many mines there are in Chile or where they are.
It has also resisted pressures to demine the borders,
arguing its struggling economy cannot afford the estimated US$250
million cost. Many of the mines are plastic, making detection
by conventional metal detectors impossible, it says.
But that may change soon. On May 3, the Chilean Congress ratified an international mine ban treaty, known as the Ottawa
Convention, coming a step closer to joining the 140 other
nations worldwide that have joined the 1997 pact.
The treaty obliges countries to clear their territory of all land-mines, destroy stockpiles and report to the United Nations secretary general the total number, type and location of any remaining land-mines.
Wanted fugitive
The Defence Ministry says two local munitions factories churned out five models in the 1970s and 1980s. One was an army
facility and the other was owned by Carlos Cardoen, an
eccentric Chilean tycoon, it says.
Cardoen figures in a US Customs list, published on May 7,
of the 10 most wanted fugitives in Latin America, with a
US$500,000 reward for information on his whereabouts.
The US Department of Justice's Criminal Division issued a
warrant for Cardoen's arrest in 1993 for the alleged illegal
export of US-made zirconium and parts to make cluster bombs.
It said Cardoen was a major supplier of cluster bombs to Saddam
Hussein's regime in Iraq during the 1980s.
Once the mine ban treaty goes into effect for Chile, it
will have a maximum of 30 years to clear its minefields. Until
then, Gustavo Soto's advice is: "watch your step."