On the International Day of Awareness Against Anti-Personnel Mines, the operation of the mine clearance specialists of the National Army that, this year, have intervened about 400,000 square meters of the National Geography is highlighted.
In addition to clearance tasks, soldiers have destroyed 33 explosive devices, leading mobility through previously contaminated terrain.
In addition to the contribution to the security of Colombians, humanitarian demining contributes to the development and economy of communities; such is the case of the municipality of Pradera, Valle del Cauca, which today is part of the regional tourist route.
Claudia Lucumí, Municipal Government Secretary, points out that tourism has increased by 100 percent thanks to humanitarian demining: "the peasants use a lot of what we call "undone (paths)" to gain time, and in these paths there were these explosive devices. The demining has given us a lot of support in the tourist reactivation, Pradera is already a municipality that is on the tourist route; extreme sports are done, triathlon, mountain biking, running, running through the canyon of the Bolo River, among others; we have tourists from many departments and foreigners, that is how, thanks to the accompaniment of Humanitarian Demining, we can say that tourism trusts our municipality at 100 percent".
In the municipality Bolo Blanco, the mine clearance specialists have found 13 antipersonnel mines on roads and main roads, according to the second sergeant Carlos Daniel Segura, leader of demining in Pradera, who adds: "You can see that the finding and destruction of these devices has helped the community, since it can be seen that these roads and main roads are used by different type of athletes".
For his part, Alexander Muñoz Quijano, representative of the association of peasant farmers of the municipality Bolo Blanco, in Pradera, Valle del Cauca, notes that the mine clearance specialists destroyed four anti-personnel mines and now is possible to take the farm animals without any fear: "here many cows of neighbors and partners have fallen in the mines, so we only could have the animals where we could, at the side of the house, after the clearance, now they can walk free. It is hard to see how far the evil of human beings reaches all and the animals, a cow for the peasant is the sustenance and there he lost the food, it is hard to see this happening in the countryside, because this situation marks the communities, the mines enclosed you, we thank God after those of the demining made the intervention, they found three or four mines here on this farm, still active, individuals had buried them and practically they were bombs".
Currently, soldiers are carrying out 128 humanitarian demining operations in 61 municipalities in Colombia to ensure progress.
Source: Press-National Army Humanitarian Demining Brigade
