A mobile sapper team searching for bombs, landmines and other unexploded ordinance in northern Quang Tri province has discovered 114 bombs with their fuses intact. These bombs had been disposed of at a landfill in Lao Bao town by traders of metal scraps on Apr 22. The team said that these bombs had been left in the province during the Vietnam War (1954-1975). They included 155 mm artillery shells, 120 mm and 60 mm mortars, and MK118 bomblets. In addition, many B40 grenades and M16 landmines were also found. The team have defused the bombs and brough them to a safe place. Earlier, on March 5, the team handled 651 bombs that had been discovered 200 meters from the landfill, Nguyen Van Cuong, head of the team, said. A week later, a mobile sapper team of Peace Trees Vietnam (PTVN) successfully defused two bombs in a deep hole on a mountain side near Khe Sanh town in Huong Hoa district. According to sappers, the bombs were MK82s, each weighing 750 pounds and made in the US. UXO has been a big problem in Vietnam since the war ended in April 1975, with more than 20% of the land in the country still contaminated with bombs and mines and over 100,000 people, including children, have been killed or injured, said Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan at a UXO-related meeting on April 1. At the ASEAN Defense Senior Officials’ Meeting (ADSOM) in Brunei on April 2, Deputy Defence Minister, Senior Lieutenant General Nguyen Chi Vinh proposed that ASEAN set up a group of experts in charge of resolving the serious consequences and threats of unexploded bombs, mines and explosives leftover from wars. Such an initiative will be helpful not only for Vietnam but also for other countries which are facing heavy consequences and threats from bombs, mines and explosives left unresolved from wars in the past, Vinh said. (Tuoi Tre –Youth April 23)
