Cairo hosts symposium on land mines

Arab League Secretary General Esmat Abdul Meguid stressed on Sunday in Cairo that the problem of land mines in the Arab states constitutes a great challenge to economic and social development and a danger to the population.

In a speech read on his behalf by his assistant for social affairs, Dawo Sweidan, the Arab League chief called in the inauguration of a seminar on "land mines and their impacts on economic and social developments in the Arab homeland" for continued efforts to warn against the dangers of land mines, and to limit its production and use through diverting the attention of governmental and non-governmental organizations to the consequences of this problem, the crises inflicted by the mines and the call to provide technical assistance to eliminate them.

The AL chief expressed his hope of materializing the final statement released by the recent Afro-European summit held in Cairo, in which the leaders of the African and European states agreed on the importance of providing technical and financial aid to the African states to help them eliminate the land mines and to contribute to the rehabilitation of victims of land mines.

The AL secretary general warned against this problem from which the Arab states suffer in the main obstacles hindering social and economic development. He stated that 40% of the total land mines planted in the world are located in the Arab states.

Meanwhile, the chairman of the conference, Hassan Issa, called for setting up a national Arab Egyptian committee to coordinate regional efforts in the land mine problem and the Arab League to take the initial step in this proposal.

During its three-day deliberations, the seminar will discuss several issues, including the dimensions of the question of land mines in the Arab states and means of setting up an integrated mechanism for fighting mines, in which experts from the Arab states and related organizations are to take part.