'Anti-personnel mines still a menace despite treaty'

Presenting the 2004 Landmine Monitor report, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) said there was no room for complacency despite a 1999 treaty that banned the devices.

Speaking at the report's global launch at Nato headquarters here, Jody Williams, a US campaigner who won the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize with the ICBL, said the treaty had taken firm hold in many parts of the world.

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"But even bigger challenges remain, to convince hold-out governments to come on board, to get mines out of the ground within the 10-year deadline, and to provide adequate assistance to landmine victims," she said.

Since the Ottawa Treaty took force in 1999, 65 countries have completed the destruction of their stockpiles, collectively destroying more than 37 million anti-personnel mines, the report said.