寮國炸彈獵人
PRI的 Mary Stucky 與We Help War Victims(我們幫助戰後受害者) 創始人 Jim Harris 兩人同行緩緩的穿越寮國南部, 調查廢金屬貿易.Stucky自己暴露在未爆彈尚未清除的地區, 觀察村民在受舊炸彈污染的土地挖掘廢金屬. 接著, 為了能完成調查, Stucky 冒險的進入充滿了火箭，迫擊砲，炸彈和其他未爆彈藥的鑄造場. 她的報告揭露出在鑄造廠裡的情況是如何的威脅著生命.
當你沒有錢, 也沒有任何機會可以賺錢, 你會做任何事情為了生存下去. 這包括冒著生命危險去賺那一天幾塊錢的工資. 這是東南亞地區, 寮國許多的大人與小孩在做的. 他們長途跋涉到森林中尋找可以出售的廢舊金屬,好換取現金. 危險的是, 這些廢金屬是包括大量當初越戰所遺留下來的炸彈. 有許多這種炸彈都尚未爆炸. Mary Stucky 於寮國Boualapha Disrict報導這致命的工作.
以下為PRI電台的對話:( 轉載至The PRI’s World, http://www.theworld.org/2009/09/02/laotian-bomb-hunters/ )
Mary Stucky: During the Vietnam War, Laos became per capita the most bombed place on earth. Today, the mountainous jungle near the Vietnam border is still pockmarked with craters from U-S bombs. These were cluster bombs, each about the size of a tennis ball. About a third never exploded. Aid worker Roger Rumpf says that’s about 80 million unexploded bombs littering the countryside. (越戰期間，寮國(老撾)成為地球上轟炸最嚴重的地方。今天, 越南邊境附近的山區叢林中仍是遍佈密密麻麻由美國炸彈留下來的彈坑. 這些是集束炸彈, 子炸彈每顆約網球大小的球. 大約有三分之一還沒有爆炸。Roger Rumpf 援助工作者說，那是約 80萬枚未爆炸的炸彈丟棄在農村裡。)
Roger Rumpf: “They’re everywhere. You walk down a path, you move anywhere, you gotta watch what you’re stepping on and you’ll probably be stepping on a few underneath the ground. They’re hidden– you cannot see them anymore.” (他們(炸彈)無所不在。您走的每條路，您移動的任何地方，你總得注意觀察你踏的每一步, 還有你可能踩的地面下有可能藏了幾個。他們是隱藏的，你永遠看不到他們.)
Stucky: They may be hard to see, but they can be found. Laotians go looking for the bombs using cheap metal detectors. They dig up the bombs and sell them to scrap dealers. (他們(炸彈)可能很難看到, 但可以找到. 寮國人會使用很便宜的金屬探測去尋找這些炸彈, 然後將他們挖出來在賣給廢金屬交易商)
Most people in Laos are subsistence farmers so collecting scrap is their only way to earn cash. Pong Sy regularly hunts for what the Lao call “bombies.” (大部分的寮國人是自給的農民, 所以收集廢金屬是他們唯一賺現金的方法. Pong Sy 定期會去尋找寮國人常叫的”bombies”)
Pong Sy (in Lao) 以下為Pong Sy (寮國)的口述, 由Mary Stucky翻譯至英文.Pong Sy hunts for “bombies.”
(Pong Sy專門尋獵bombies, 也就是束集炸彈的子炸彈)
Stucky: Sy says this earns him about five dollars a day. In Sy’s village nearly every family hunts scrap and everyone knows someone who’s been injured or killed in the process. Just last year, two of Sy’s cousins died collecting scrap when the bombs they picked up exploded. (Sy說這工作大約可賺5元美金一天. 在Sy的村裡, 幾乎每個家庭都會尋獵廢金屬, 而每個人都知道在尋獵廢金屬的過程中有誰受了傷或是死亡. 去年, Sy的兩個表兄在蒐集廢金屬時身亡, 當時他們撿起來的炸彈爆炸. )
Since that time, the price of scrap metal has dropped dramatically — almost in half. But people here keep on collecting bombs, according to Tom Morgan. He’s with the Nobel-prize-winning anti-land mines organization, the Mines Advisory Group. (從那次之後, 賣廢金屬的價錢大幅下降 – 幾乎少了一半. 但Tom Morgan說村民依然持續在蒐集炸彈. ( Tom Morgan為”反地雷組織”的地雷諮詢小組成員之一, 該組織為諾貝爾獎得主)
Tom Morgan: “People make a choice between being able to support their family or not and if the only choice they have is being involved in the scrap metal trade that’s what they’ll do even though they know there are risks involved.” (他們必須在是否支撐家庭裡做決擇, 如果他們唯一的選擇是必須做廢金屬交易, 那他們也會做, 即使他們知道會將自己投入危險中.)
Stucky: At this foundry right in the city of Paksan, trucks pull up loaded with scrap — all kinds of stuff — old pipes, chains, fans, table tops and some bombs and bomb fragments – everything dumped into a fire of molten metal. (這個位於Paksan城市裡的鑄造廠, 卡車裡裝滿了廢金屬 – 各種種類的東西 – 舊水管, 鏈條，風扇，桌面和一些炸彈和炸彈碎片 – 一切都傾入火裡, 熔化成金屬。)
寮國 Thakek的廢料廠
Jim Harris: “It’s an accident waiting to happen. Somebody’s going to die here.” ( 這裡隨時都有意外在準備發生. 有人會死在這裡.)
Stucky: Jim Harris is an American who works in Laos educating people about the dangers of the bombs. Accidents in these foundries are common – even deaths. In one foundry the Mines Advisory Group found 25 thousand pieces of live ordinance. ( Jim Harris (WHWV創始人)是在寮國教育人民了解炸彈的危險的美國人. 鑄造廠發生的意外非常常見 – 甚至是死亡. 地雷諮詢小組曾在其中一個鑄造廠裡找到25000個未爆炸彈)
Jim Harris took me to meet a scrap dealer in the town of Tahkek. ( Jim Harris帶我到Tahkek城裡與一個廢金屬交易商見面.)
Woman speaking Lao (談關於寮國的女人)
Stucky: She told us, yes she buys bombs, but she’s careful and knows how to handle them. Harris isn’t so sure. (她跟我們說, 是的, 她買炸彈, 但是她非常的小心並且知道如何處理它們. Harris則不能肯定她真的知道.)
Harris: “She just stepped on a bombie half I wouldn’t step on because we don’t know what’s underneath it. See, she’s picking up and tossing them around we don’t want to stay here too long. (她正踩在半個bombie上, 我並不會踩在那上面, 因為我們並不知道下面是什麼. 你看, 她正撿起來並往周圍丟, 我們最好不要在這留太久.)
This man lost part of a leg collecting bombs for scrap (這男人為廢金屬在蒐集炸彈而失去一隻腳的某部份)
Tom Morgan (Mines Advisory Group地雷諮詢小組): “The sad truth is that while people can get away with it for a certain period of time in the end they will die carrying on those activities. Because if you haven’t been trained and you don’t have genuine authentic technical skills in the end you will come across a bomb that you think you know how to diffuse and you don’t because some of them are essentially booby trapped or variations of the standard type that don’t work in the same way and in the end those people all die.” (可悲的事實是, 既使人們可以暫時逃過一劫, 但只要他們持續這行為一天, 最終會導致死亡. 因為如果你沒受過訓練, 也沒學到真正的技術技能, 終有一天你會遇到一個你以為知道怎麼處理的炸彈, 但事實上你並不了解, 因為有些可能是詭雷或是不同種類的炸彈, 他們引爆的條件不同, 而這些人最後依然會喪失性命.)
*集束炸彈是在與一般炸彈同樣大小的彈體中，裝入由數個到數百個的子炸彈(bombies), 子炸彈每顆約網球般大小的球體 (bombies)。由飛行器空投之後，在空中分解，藉由散佈子炸彈到廣範的地面造成區域性殺傷, 在轟炸區域範圍者, 幾乎是無法存活, 且時常發生在地面未爆裂的子炸彈對不知情平民造成傷害事件。其中約10%-30%的子炸彈不會爆炸, 未爆彈的清理相當不易. (轉至維基百科)