Demining

A joint endeavour by the Defense Ministry, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the European Union has concluded a three-year-long mine clearance project along Türkiye's eastern border.

Turkey's Defense Minister, Yaşar Güler, announced plans for Bulgaria, Romania, and Turkey to ink an agreement next month aimed at clearing mines lingering in the Black Sea, a fallout from the war in Ukraine. This initiative follows extensive discussions among NATO allies grappling with the ramifications of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

ZAGREB -The Belgrade-based company Millennium Team will take part in a Zagreb international donors' conference on humanitarian demining in Ukraine on Thursday and Friday.

Nearly one-third of Ukraine's territory has been affected by heavy fighting and is likely to require intensive demining operations, the paper said, adding that more than 67,000 square miles (173,529 square kilometers) are contaminated with unexploded ordnance, according to Slovakia-based research center GLOBSEC.

Ljubljana – In line with Ukraine’s request for international assistance through the EU’s civil protection mechanism, the government confirmed on Thursday material assistance to Ukraine in the form of demining equipment, which is valued at EUR 36,140, including transport.

Yugoslav-era mines lie scattered across the ground in an area marked off with sticks. In the middle of the area, the remains of a dead animal can be seen.

To the left, another zone is marked as 'contaminated' with unexploded ordnance, although no mines are visible to the eye. Instead they are covered by vegetation, even deadlier than if they were in plain sight.

When two deminers were killed on August 25  nearby the town of Livno in south-west Bosnia while they were on duty in one of the minefields that still blight the country, it again highlighted the dangers faced by those who are working to clear the remaining unexploded ordnance left over from the 1992-95 war.

The Hellenic Army's Land Mine Clearance Squad (TENX) recovered a total of 106 missiles, 42 hand grenades and 13 land mines dating to various conflicts from different parts of the country as part of a clearance operation last month, defense officials said on Wednesday.

The munitions were all destroyed in controlled procedures by TENX experts.

A three-judge appeals court on Tuesday acquitted Alex Rondos, a one-time adviser to former Socialist prime minister George Papandreou, over the alleged mismanagement of millions of euros in public funds by a nongovernment organization called the International Mine Initiative (IMI), which undertook demining operations in Bosnia, Iraq and Lebanon.

The US supports Serbia on demining, and Serbia's needs come first, says a representative of the US embassy in Belgrade.

However, press officer Eric Heyden told Blic, the US has received assurances from the Serbian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and the Serbian Army (VS) General Staff that Serbian deminers would not be sent to Syria.