Bangladesh military to start destroying landmine stockpiles

Bangladesh will begin destroying its stockpile of around 200,000 landmines from November 2, putting it in the forefront of efforts to eliminate the weapons in one of the world's most heavily-mined regions, a military source said Sunday. "We will start destroying anti-personnel landmines from next Tuesday under a treaty with the United Nations," the senior military official, who would not be named, told AFP.
The destruction would be completed in mid-2005 in a project funded by the Canadian government through the UN Development Programme, he said.
The army would retain around 15,000 mines to be used for training soldiers for missions, including UN peacekeeping assignments.
Bangladesh and the tiny Indian Ocean archipelago of the Maldives are the only countries in South Asia to have signed the 1997 Ottawa treaty to ban landmines.