As our supporters savor a steaming cup of coffee they can take both pride and comfort from the knowledge that their purchase of Lao Mountain Coffee pays the wages of the brave Lao men and women who locate and destroy explosive remnants of war.

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jimharris1833@gmail.com

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A 750-pound bomb will instantly turn nearby houses into flying debris which will, in turn, destroy other village structures

In an effort to help our supporters understand why our thirteen-person team could not immediately “render safe” the 750 bomb that we identified in a village, I’ve compiled a list of the steps that staff must follow when assisting a village that is threatened by such a destructive device.

Ten years ago I was a very minor member of a team that rendered safe a similar bomb, found in a similar setting. That bomb was safely destroyed in a group effort that involved more than fifty individuals: technicians, deminers, police officers and Lao soldiers.

You don’t tackle ordnance of any size (big bomb, cluster bomb, rocket, mortar, hand grenade) unless you are certain that have the staff, the skill, and the resources to do more good than harm. And then, in the words of Paul Stanford, my mentor: “You have to get it right the first time—every time!”

Critical steps:

1.  Carefully excavate the bomb.

2.   Clean the bomb sufficiently to expose markings that provide information about its fusing and content.

3.   Determine the five “W’s”:

What is it? Where is it? When was it put there? Why is it there? Whether anyone has touched it?

4.   Search the area for additional UXO.

5.   Create a map of the area indicating notable structures and features; establish the relationship of the bomb to its surroundings.

6.   Photograph structures in the village to establish “before demolition” condition.

7.   Discuss options with other EOD (Explosive Ordnance Disposal) specialists.

8.   Identify neighboring utilities: drop overhead electric lines; purge gas lines.

9.   Sandbag the site, as appropriate.

10. Inform local authorities of intent to render the bomb safe.

11. Inform, discuss and plan with local police, district military and other authorities. Seek their assistance.

12. If need be: inform provincial authorities.

13. Seek advice and consent from village chief, monks, elders and other village leaders when determining course of action and selecting work dates.

14. Determine the most appropriate window of opportunity.

15. Advertise the upcoming event.

16. Compile list of residents who will need special assistance on the day of the demolition: the elderly, the infirmed, villagers who are cognitively disabled, deaf who may be wearing Hearing Aids, blind, linguistically diverse, etc.

Immediately prior to demolition:

17. Inspect and test firing cable, exploder, and all electrical connections.

18. Monitor weather conditions relative to the comfort of evacuees and the possibility of lightning triggering the exposed ordnance.

19. Remove to safety the entire contents of adjacent houses and other structures.

20. Remove to safety the “selected” contents of more distant houses and structures. (i.e. valuable or treasured possessions).

21. Identify and publicize the sites to which residents will be evacuated. Consider both safety and comfort: toilets, drinking water, shelter from sun, wind, rain.

22. Collect explosive material and detonators from secure storage.

23. Post sentries and take control of roads and walking trails.

24. Have sentries with bullhorns walk the villages and inform residents of the need to evacuate.

25. Have staff visit the homes of villagers who have been identified with special needs: elderly, infirmed, etc.

26. Monitor and assist with the removal of livestock.

27. Maintain constant radio contact with the ring of sentries who surround the now-empty village. (Have sentries confer with their GPS units to assure correct location).

28. When the village has been evacuated and residents and their possessions are as secure as practicable, proceed with the demolition. You can look at here if you want to determine the machinery required for the demolition.

Most provinces in Laos are underserved by humanitarian clearance organizations. Given the rate at which unexploded ordnance (UXO) is being rendered safe the bombs, rockets, motors, bullets and shells that blight 2,500 villages here will outlive every human now living on our planet. But…in the nine select provinces that currently receive funding…deminers are making at least a modest effort. But, what about provinces like Phongsali, Oudomxai, and Bolykhamxai that have not, since the war ended forty years ago, received any help at all?

In underserved locations self-trained, self-proclaimed, amateur, bomb experts step up and offer their services—albeit, at a price. Need a bomblet removed from the family garden? Police won’t help; find the village expert. Children walking to school are stepping over a bomblet exposed by recent rains. Military won’t help; find the village expert. A thousand-pound bomb turns up in the village center. Humanitarian organizations can’t, or won’t, work in the province; find a village expert. Want to dismantle a cluster bomblet and turn it into a lantern? Want to harvest explosive to blow stumps out of the ground? Ask the village expert for help and he’ll gladly exchange his expertise for funds or favors.

Humanitarian organizations often find themselves in competition with village bomb experts, not for cash but for credibility and trust.
But…just how skilled are these experts? Some have a command of knowledge nearly equal to highly trained, well-compensated technical advisors employed by MAG, HALO, and other humanitarian clearance organizations. Others are over-due for an accident and are living on borrowed time.

Anyone who works in rural Laos for any appreciable length of time will meet up with a wounded bomb expert forced into retirement by a piece of ordnance that defied conventional wisdom. Or…the parent, wife, sibling or child of a deceased expert who wasn’t quite as smart as he thought he was and experienced a very bad day at work. Many village experts are alive, practicing their trade, only because they have yet to meet a device that is an exception to the rules.

Usually, when a village bomb expert bites the dust, there is little mourning among professional clearance workers. The pros know that village amateurs ignore repeated warnings and often put innocent folks at risk. (Nearly one-third of all UXO accident victims in Laos are passers-by—folks caught in the wrong place, at the wrong time. When I hear that a local expert has been killed, my first thought is, “How many others did he take with him?”

When I returned to Sop Houn village last month I inquired after the local expert, befriended by my team six years ago and nicknamed “Mr. Magnet.” A surprisingly old guy who possessed an uncanny knack for locating bombs in and around his village. I was genuinely saddened to learn that, in my absence, Mr. Magnet had died. And, frankly, surprised that he had achieved his three score years and ten without accidently blowing himself to bits. When I asked his friends whether he had been killed working on ordnance they assured me that “No. He just got sick and died”.

Clearance workers in Laos can encounter up to 300 different kinds of ordnance. Mr. Magnet was skilled but modest. When he found something he didn’t know he was wise enough to leave it along. He understood the danger of tampering with the unfamiliar.

Good for Mr. Magnet. He died in bed in spite of frequently taking bombs apart and using explosives to his own advantage: blowing stumps out of the ground, stunning fish that he would then collect and carry to market, blasting craters to divert streams in the direction of his thirsty rice fields.

Mr. Magnet knew that our safety lectures were, given the realities of Phongsali, mostly bullshit; too polite to confront the admonition to “leave UXO to the experts” he simply dismissed that old hoax with good-natured laughter. He knew that since no help was coming he should, at a minimum, learn to coexist with the crap that kept turning up. And…all the better if he could learn to recycle dangerous litter in a way that improved his life.

Our We Help War Victims team was the singular contradiction challenging Mr. Magnet’s cynical view on promises of eventual help. Much to his surprise our team, in defiance of Lao government regulations, worked in and around Sop Houn village for four dry seasons. (The most telling description I can give of Sop Houn is that it’s a village of 96 houses and 58 bomb craters. The final season we worked there we destroyed 105 pieces of ordnance in 42 days. Frequently, it was Mr. Magnet who led our team to items he had discovered and wisely declined to touch.)

Mr. Magnet could be magnanimous. Many a time he risked his life removing or destroying ordnance that turned up on neighboring farms; items that frightened folks and hindered their struggle to eke out a living as subsistence farmers.

Mr. Magnet set the goal of diverting a stream and thereby bringing water to his new rice field. He would call upon our team to blow up ordnance that he claimed to have found (conveniently) along the path of the ditch he was digging.

He could also be a scamp. Once, our team went to his farm, at his request, to blow up an M-83 cluster bomblet. (A cluster bomblet packed with 200 grams of high explosive; a device so cranky that we always decline to move them and, instead, blow them up in place). We found Mr. Magnet’s bomblet, conveniently perched behind a boulder that he had been struggling, unsuccessfully, to move.

Another time, he took issue with our intent to conduct a controlled explosion near a large, impressively configured tree that had spiritual significance to village elders. Mr. Magnet failed to win that argument rhetorically. But our debate became moot when, overnight, the item slated for demolition simply disappeared. I didn’t waste a second interrogating other suspects.

(In my twenty-three years as a school principal I’ve had hundreds of guilty children look me in the eye and profess innocence; I’ve never met a better liar than Mr. Magnet, nor one that I’ve felt more affection for).

I’m proud to have had Mr. Magnet for a friend. Working as he did, in a province ignored for forty years by his own government and every humanitarian clearance organization certified to work in Laos, he was a brave, generous, civic-minded man. He was a rarity: a self-trained, self-proclaimed village bomb expert who gave his trade a good name.

Three days in the field and each day a different challenge. I keep telling myself, “If this job was easy, what would they need us for?”

Every signal from our metal detectors must be explored, even if the deminers must chip through rock and stone

The first day, we might as well have been working on a paved parking lot. The landowner, in the recent past, was either coerced or given the opportunity to let a road crew store road material on his property. The advantage to him, aside from the unlikely possibility of rent, was that the road crew leveled the site of trees and brush. Then, after the road construction was finished, they removed all but a base layer of gravel and crushed rock. The landowner tells us that he’d like to dig a fishpond on the site.

The challenge for us is that we got readings on our metal detectors indicating the presence of metal refuse, possibly ordnance, beneath the base layer of rock. But, over the years that layer has hardened to near-concrete density. Several of our metal shovels left the field curled like the toes of Aladdin’s slippers.

The fact that heavy construction equipment had traversed the property numerous times and applied massive weight to the base layer was no guarantee that UXO didn’t remain. There could have been large aircraft-delivered bombs, weighing a thousand pounds or more buried deep underground.

The guys literally chipped away at the job and thoroughly cleared the site but they spent a full day working an area that under normal circumstances would have been a half-day job.

On the next site we found poor scrub cutting. The actual machete work wasn’t bad, the farmer followed our admonition that all existing vegetation had to be cut to a height of four inches (so we can get our detectors close enough to the ground to get optimal performance). The problem was that the farmer left the cut vegetation in place, following the centuries old habit of “slash and burn.” But, we’re here early in the dry season, weeks before conditions will permit a thorough burn. As a consequence, our guys, who earn three times the daily pay of day laborers, had to rake the farmer’s brush into windrows—a poor use of skilled labor.

Working around felled trees. Deminers must take special care because they know they can’t miss a spot the size of a walnut or they’ll set a farmer up for an accident.

At the third site, we found ourselves in a previously timbered area that a year ago the farmer cut and burned in anticipation of planting coffee—his family’s first cash crop. It saddens me to see the diameter of the trees the family felled. Those trees, some over a hundred feet tall were survivors survived of aerial bombardment during the war. And, likely, defoliation spraying as well. Now, those centuries-old trees are lying as blacked logs over the site.

The challenge for us is to work around all the fallen trees. The burn thoroughly removed all the undergrowth and all but the largest limbs. Fire turned decades, perhaps centuries, of compressed leaf matter to ash.

As is fundamental to slash and burn cultivation (“swidden”) the farmer left all the charred tree stumps in place. Their buried root systems will hold the exposed soil in place while his coffee seedlings establish a footing, and the largest of the charred timbers will provide shade for the tender coffee plants for years to come.

But, to guarantee the farmer a safe garden we must clamber over and around hundreds, perhaps thousands, of blacked, arboreal skeletons that just a year ago would have towered overhead. And if our detectors indicate metal under a log, we must excavate cautiously in tight quarters.

It would be a fool’s wager to bet that the fire that burned this forest also destroyed any subterranean UXO or that bomblets that survived have been proved harmless. In truth, the more abuse ordnance is subjected to, the crankier it gets.

Strictly speaking, although burning is a common practice, we can’t advise farmers to burn fields ahead of our deminers. Too many accidents have occurred when farmers—tending a fire—have been injured by exploding ordnance. We recommend the preferred practice of stacking brush in windrows.

In many legal cases, polygraph tests are employed to discern the truth in criminal investigations. They can be a useful tool in gathering evidence, and are often used in conjunction with other investigative techniques. Contact lie detectors uk for professional services.

Our deminers can use their detectors to check for UXO along both sides of a windrow. After the ground to either side of the row has been confirmed safe, the deminers will use long poles to lift and flip the windrowed brush over onto safe ground and proceed to check the soil beneath.

Everyone agrees that it’s a bad idea to move bomblets and other dangerous items. But, when there is no one to provide a safe alternative, what’s a farmer to do?

As the team worked in the forest clearing a parcel that a Lao farmer hopes to turn into a coffee garden I tried, for the sake of warmth, to keep myself in motion. Adjacent to their work area was an expansive field that was slashed, burnt and put under cultivation at least three or four years ago.

That zone was more windswept than the forest, but as the morning mist lifted, the sun both brightened my spirits and warmed my body.

By my third lap around the perimeter of the two-acre site I was comfortably warm and looking for a purpose that would justify my deserting the thirteen men still working in the cold, shaded forest. I decided to keep myself in motion playing a solitary game I call “Where Would I Put The Bombie”.

Farmers reckon that ordnance placed on tree stumps, ant hills or termite mounds are safer than items left where people might step. 50% of all accidents with UXO occur when someone is intentionally handling ordnance.

In these parts it’s nearly inevitable that the land being readied for cultivation will harbor unexploded ordnance—relics of aerial assault: bombs, cluster munitions, rockets and other projectiles. If the area was the site of ground action there could be bullets, artillery shells, hand grenades, mortar rounds and the like.

Some of these explosive remnants of war will explode in the intense heat of the fire lit to consume the cut and dried vegetation. Items on the surface that survive the fire will, after decades hidden from site in the underbrush, finally be exposed. And, when the farmer and his family begin to work the soil in preparation for planting, they may well discover objects that have been hidden from sight for forty years or more.

The stuff that the farmer finds after the burn is his to deal with and most Lao farmers will deal with it wisely. If it can remain where it was discovered the farmer might roll a log over it, or bury it beneath a pyramid of rock. There it will sit for years while the family works the site. When the thin tropical soil plays out and the family moves on to slash and burn a new area the ordnance will be left behind, destined to live out its hundred-year life-span hidden beneath logs or rocks.

But often, a farmer who finds ordnance inconveniently underfoot will choose to lift the item and gently place it where no family member is likely to step. Farmers drop bomblets down hollow trees; they set them atop tree stumps, anthills and termite mounds.

My game, “Where Would I Put The Bombie” requires that I walk an entire site and inspect every tree stump, hollow tree, anthill and other tempting depositories for relocated ordnance. Today, in an hour’s time I found two tree stumps that each held parts of once dangerous ordnance. In both cases, the items that the farmer discovered and feared were in a condition that left them incapable of further harm, but the farmers didn’t know that and were wary enough of their family’s safety that risking injury by moving the objects was judged to be better than leaving them where found.

A final, sobering statistic: In Laos, of the many thousands of accidents with UXO that have occurred since the war ended forty years ago, nearly half involved someone intentionally handling the device. Those unlucky farmers, who tried but didn’t make it to the nearest tree stump died trying to keep their loved ones safe.

We Help War Victims is the only NGO that has provided villages in Phongsali Province with area clearance and rapid response. More than fifteen years ago, nine of eighteen Lao provinces were chosen to get priority over other less contaminated provinces. Although funding has increased dramatically, long-neglected provinces like Phongsali are still without help.

Here’s a map showing the pattern of bombing in Phongsali Province. Yet, this province has never been approved to receive UXO removal by UXO/LAO, MAG, Halo, Norwegian Peoples’ Aid or any other humanitarian organization that has functioned here. The only help that Phongsali villagers have received in forty years was from WHWV during four consecutive dry-season projects. (Projects conducted without Lao government approval).

More than fifteen years ago, when international funding was almost nil, Laos performed triage and chose to put all efforts and funds into the nine most contaminated provinces and to delay work in other provinces until funding increased. In my sixteen years here I’ve seen US funds doubled and doubled and doubled again. But…still not a dime to those long-neglected provinces.

I’m pleased to hear that President Obama advocates doing more to remove the blight of UXO from Laos, but I’ll bet he doesn’t know that our current funding only aids 9 of 18 provinces here. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that our State Department Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement hasn’t got a clue.

It’s not as if no one has asked. Danish Church Aid, learning of WHWV work in Phongsali, requested funds from the US to perform UXO clearance and “rapid response” to villager-discovered ordnance. That request was denied and funds went…where? Where they’ve always gone—to the same nine provinces that were selected more than fifteen years ago when US funding was a fraction of what it is today.

This bomb lay under sheets of tin and a pile of rubbish for years outside a small village shop. The owner grabbed us when she recognized the first opportunity in years to get rid of the danger

A couple invested family funds to open a small shop and then, after they were committed to the location, discovered a bomb thirty feet from their door. From the moment of it’s discovery the bomb controlled their lives. Should they invest more funds in expanding their shop in that location? Should they warm customers about the danger of parking their motorbikes near the bomb? How closely should they monitor smokers who might discard a burning cigarette near the dried grass that hid the bomb from view?

They considered a warning sign but markers would only draw curiosity seekers or scrap collectors or inquisitive children whose tampering might endanger the village. Better, they decided, to cover the bomb with sheets of galvanized roofing material and pile trash on top of it. People in the village would know what lurked beneath the trash; passersby, and children born since the bomb’s discovery, would never explore the site.

I wasn’t in this village five minutes before the shopkeeper trotted up to me and insisted that I look at her bomb. (In a country where you can wait forty years for UXO removal, if you find a bomb, it’s YOUR BOMB. If you find a landmine, it’s YOUR LANDMINE.)

I asked the woman for her patience. Not hours, days, weeks, or months. But, time enough for our team to eat lunch after a morning’s labor in nearby fields. I suspect that she feared we would slip away but we were, after lunch, true to our word.

We carefully moved the device out of the populated area and into the forest for demolition.

The site was too close to habitations for us to do much with it, and not wanting to leave it exposed for any length of time, we chose to transport it out of town for eventual destruction. You might well ask, “How do you transport bombs?” The joke is, we transport them like porcupines make love: very carefully.

All deminers, whether male or female, must work as a team to manage difficult tasks that no single individual could perform.

Conducted in Phongsali Province, March, 2011

Yai
Please introduce yourself.

Davine:
Good morning. My name is Davine. I come from Ban Houayho village. I am 19 years old. I have four brothers and sisters. I am the oldest.

Yai:
What Province?

Davine:
Champasack Province, Paksong District.

Yai:
Is your village situated on the mountain or on the plateau?

Davine:
We live on the plateau.

Yai:
What is the main occupation of the people in your village?

Davine:
We do upland crop farming and coffee farming. Not very people do paddy rice farming.

Yai:
What made you want to come to work as a deminer?

Davine:
I want to gain more experience. Early on, when I was a student, I didn’t do very well in school. I dropped out of school to assist my parents with a charcoal-making project.

When the naiban of our village announced [that a UXO clearance company was looking for workers] I decided to apply. When I asked my parents they agreed. They said if you want to apply, go ahead. That’s when I joined Phoenix Clearance Ltd. (PCL).

Yai:
When you applied, did you think the work would be hard?

Davine:
Many of my friends said, “Work as a deminer is difficult. And, it’s a man’s job!” Some friends asked, “Why would you work for [a UXO clearance company?”]

I told them, “At the beginning I was afraid, but after Mr. Vilasak trained me, I’m no longer afraid. I feel confident now.

Yai:
So, a woman can do the work?

Davine: Yes. Women and men can both do the work. But…perhaps…men can do better.

Yai:
What do you prefer, “area clearance” or “response team”?

Davine:
I like both.

Yai:
Aren’t you afraid of a bomb accidentally exploding?

Davine:
No, I’m not afraid. In the beginning I was a little afraid, but not any longer. Not any more. I like to hear the blast!

Yai:
You like listening to the bang?

Davine:
Yes.

Yai:
We noticed that when you were assigned to work as a sentry and were supposed to use the megaphone to warn people about the demolition, you looked shy. Were you embarrassed to do that?

Davine:
At the beginning, since I never before in my life had used a megaphone, I was a bit nervous. Now, it’s no problem. I can also use the radio. I have no problem now.

Yai:
Do you get homesick?

Davine:
Sometimes.

Yai:
Do you call home, now and then? Who do you call the most?

Davine:
My mother. I miss her.

Yai:
Are you married?

Davine:
No, I’m still single.

Yai:
What did your mother and father tell you when you left home to start work as a deminer?

Davine:
They told me to look after myself. Don’t work hastily. Take it slowly. Try to get along with your teammates. Don’t get clumsy.

Yai:
That’s about working around UXO. Did they give you any advice about life?

Davine:
They also told me, don’t have too many boyfriends. Don’t drink too much because you have work to do.

Yai:
What do you do with the pay that you earned as a deminer?

Davine:
I give it to my mother.

Yai:
What will you buy with your savings?

Davine:
I’d like to buy a motorbike.

Yai:
As a deminer, aren’t you afraid of an accident with UXO?

Davine:
At the beginning I was afraid but after I went to UXO training and I had the experience of working in the field, I lost my fear. But, at the beginning I was afraid. I feel comfortable of handling the job now.

Yai:
Does your village have any history of accidents with UXO? Anyone lost a life, or an arm, or a leg?

Davine:
I’ve seen victims before.

Yai:
How do you feel about the need to clear UXO from your country?

Davine:
I deeply, from my heart, wish to see PCL destroy UXO. Here, [where we are no working] and in my village, Ban Houayho, if that’s possible.

Yai:
How do you think UXO has affected the lives of Lao people?

Davine:
In my village there isn’t too much ordnance so we are not that afraid when we work in the fields. We’re only afraid when we happen upon it. If we don’t see it, we aren’t afraid.

Yai:
When working with a response team you sometimes have to lift big bombs [weighing 300 pounds or more]. Does the work wear you down?

Davine:
No, because in my village I worked harder than this! I worked on our farm and I think that was harder than the work we do as a deminer. I think our work here is much lighter.

Yai:
Could you see yourself doing this work for the rest of your life? Or, do you just want to save some money and then look for different work to do?

Davine:
I think, if its possible, I’d like to continue to work as a deminer, until the end. I don’t care where [in Laos] they have me work.

Yai:
How many Americans have you met?

Davine:
None. We’ll none except Mr. Jim.

Since I was born I haven’t been out of my village much. I just stay close to home. Since I was young I worked on the farm or worked in the house. When the village had a special event I was not allowed to go out and play.

Yai:
How far from your village have you ever travelled?

Davine:
Only within my district. This is my first time out. I’ve never even been to Pakse! Never been there. However, I’ve been to Paksong. Most of my time was spent in my home.

Yai:
How long were you on the bus from your village to here in Phongsali?

Davine:
Three nights and four days!

Yai:
If, as deminer, you visit a school to talk about safety, what would you tell students?

Davine:
I would tell students that UXO is dangerous and nobody should touch or tamper with ordnance. Because UXO can kill. I’d tell them, “If you see it, leave it alone; don’t touch it. Tell an adult and take them to see it. Or, make a sign at the location and ask the UXO response team to deal with it.

Yai:
We’ve noticed that whenever you see babies in the village you are very happy.

Davine:
[Laughs] Yes, because I miss my brothers and sisters. When I see children I think of them. I miss them.

Yai:
Someday, when you are married, how many children do you want to have?

Davine:
[Laughs] Three will be enough!

Now, to compare answers to several questions:

On parental advice:

Kik: My parents told me that when you are working focus on your job; don’t play too much. Concentrate on your work.

Omphon: They told me that when I am far from home I should behave and not go out drinking. I should listen to my boss.

On de-mining being a “man’s job”.

Kik: [Emphatically] A woman can do the work also!

Omphon: In the beginning I knew it was men’s work, but after training I now believe women can do it. I feel confident working with UXO. Because I worked on our farm, I can carry heavy loads.

Nuey: Although many think it’s a man’s job, women can do the work also. In the beginning I was afraid of UXO. I thought I couldn’t do the job. As time went by I got more confident and I’m no longer afraid.

At first I thought it was hard work but once I got into it I found that it wasn’t all that hard. I can do it. I know that its men’s work, but I like it.

On what she will do with her pay.

Kik: I will send all my money to my parents. It’s up to them, what they want to buy. If my mother wants to build a new house, then I will send the money.

Omphon: I give my pay to my parents. They bought a streamer [weed cutter]. They also bought rice because they are poor.

Nuey: I will give it to my mother and my younger sister. I don’t know what my mother will do with the money. Probably buy food. I want my younger sister to go to school.

On homesickness.

Kik: I call my mother every day. I miss her every day. I call my brothers and sisters when I miss them.

Nuey: Mostly, I miss my mother. I call her. I tell her not to worry about me. I’m fine here, working with the UXO team. I’m just worried that she will worry about me, since I’m so far away from home.

Every dry season since 2013 I’ve seen this bomb casing in a village near our camp. It’s not that the responsible team was too busy to destroy the dangerous, intact “booster”. In fact, they refused to make the casing safe until the villagers agreed to give them the casing to sell as scrap.

Two weeks later I was back in that village to meet with the parents of two teens who were killed days earlier when they attempted to scrape mud off an odd device they found but couldn’t identify. What killed the two boys was a “booster” from inside a large, aircraft-delivered bomb. As the term implies, a bomb’s booster (not much larger than a soda can but filled with high explosive) is intended to detonate along with the bomb’s nose fuse and contribute to the detonation of the canister’s main charge.

Ever since that accident I’ve been well aware of the damage a booster alone can inflict and, whenever I encounter a seemingly empty bomb casing, I check to see if one might be lurking within. I’ve been rewarded a surprising number of times.

Three years ago, in Dak Ran village, I spotted a fractured bomb casing with a dented but intact booster — it looked, perhaps not innocent, but far from sinister. Knowing the danger that the device posed should someone tamper with it, or a grass fire heat up the casing, I immediately referred the bomb to the organization tasked to destroy dangerous items in or near that village.

(Keep reading and you’ll learn why I’ve chosen to not name that organization; it wouldn’t be fair to tar an entire organization with a brush intended for just a few irresponsible employees.)

Three years after my referral, I happened upon the same bomb sitting in the same village where I’d encountered it previously. When I asked villagers whether any staff from the responsible organization had inspected the device they told me that deminers had visited, but had refused to destroy the booster unless the man who claimed the casing renounced ownership. (The deminers’ intent was to destroy the booster and then truck the empty casing to the local scrap yard, sell it, and pocket Lao currency equal to twenty or thirty US dollars).

The farmer refused to surrender the casing and the deminers departed, telling him: “You keep the casing; you can keep the booster, too.”

We grew tired of seeing villagers living in harm’s way so we arbitrarily broke the impasse. We destroyed the booster and returned the casing, now safe to sell as scrap, to the family who originally found it.

Yesterday, we broke the impasse. We didn’t ask anyone’s permission; we didn’t bargain. We showed up unannounced, gingerly lifted the casing onto the bed of our pickup and slowly, carefully trucked it into the countryside. Then, we slapped a wad of C4 high explosive onto the booster, retreated a few hundred meters and blew it to bits. We then loaded the casing back in our truck and returned it to, perhaps, the most bull-headed farmer in Sekong Province.

Did we reward a stubborn farmer for putting his neighbors at risk? Frankly, Scarlet… (Sometimes, I simply lack the patience to ponder moral imperatives).

Due to drastic budget cuts UXO/Laos has announced that it is laying off 200 employees, out of a total workforce of 1,200.

[Please note that the original article stated that 500 employees would be laid off. Later, UXO/Lao stated that the correct number is 200]

“These employees are having to leave UXO Lao because there is no money to pay them,” he said.

According to the meeting, on the fourth anniversary of the Entry into Force of the Convention on Cluster Munitions last August, it was reported to international donors that UXO Lao would face shortages in funding and contributions towards the clearance of unexploded ordnance from contaminated areas by the end of last year.

International donors were requested to provide more funds to UXO bodies in Laos so clearance work could continue in the provinces.

The National Regulatory Authority then reported at a two day sector policy forum on the UXO survey in target development areas and UXO victim assistance in October that the number of UXO victims was within the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) No. 9 limit for 2015, but was still too high.

Many people are still being killed or injured by the deadly devices each month.
Mr Saleumsay said it was a challenge to source more funding from international donors for clearance operations.

So far this year, donors have not confirmed they will support UXO clearance in Laos.
Donors may want to know the plans for UXO clearance from now until 2017 as they may want to propose funding support from their governments.

However, UXO Lao and other non-government organisations are set to undertake technical surveys of each area before starting any clearance work.

It is hoped these surveys will show which areas of land need to be cleared and which others are free of UXO.

This preliminary work will result in much faster clearance of large areas, releasing land more quickly for use or development. In the past clearance has been quite slow as they have been following a policy of clearing all areas m arked red on the map, which signifies the areas where UXO is thought to be.

According to the National Regulatory Authority last year, over 44,000 hectares of land have been cleared since 1996.

Up to 37 percent of the country’s total land area, about 87,000 km2, may be contaminated with various types of UXO.