Belarus
Casualties and Victim Assistance
Casualties
Casualty Overview
|
All known casualties by end 2014 |
6,194 mine/ERW casualties (2,676 killed; 3,518 injured) |
|
Casualties in 2014 |
3 (2013: 0) |
|
2014 Casualties by outcome |
1 killed; 2 injured (2013: 0 killed) |
In 2014, there were three reported new casualties of explosive remnants of war (ERW) in the Republic of Belarus. A man and a woman were injured in an incident involving tampering with unexploded World War II ordnance in their home in April.[1] Another man was killed while looking for World War II-era ERW in November.[2] No new casualties were identified in Belarus in 2013. In 2012, two ERW casualties were identified: a father and son were killed in a tampering incident caused by an unexploded grenade.[3] No landmine casualties have been reported in Belarus since 2004.
There were at least 6,194 mine/ERW casualties (2,676 killed; 3,518 injured) in Belarus from 1945 to the end of 2014.[4]
Victim Assistance
Most mine/ERW survivors in Belarus were injured by ERW left over from World War II or during military service in Afghanistan in the 1980s. The total number of mine/ERW survivors in Belarus is unknown, and it has not been reported how many of the 3,513 registered survivors are still alive.
There is no specific victim assistance coordination or planning in Belarus. The Ministry of Labor and Social Protection is the main government agency responsible for protecting the rights of persons with disabilities.[5] The Ministry of Health and several other agencies also had a “State Programme on Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation of Disabled Persons” for the period from 2011 to 2015.[6]
As of 1 September 2014, Belarus had not signed the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD).
[1] “В витебской квартире подорвался черный копатель” (“Black digger exploded in Vitebsk”), By24.org, 7 April 2014.
[2] “На снаряде времен Великой Отечественной войны подорвался «черный копатель» из Витебскойо” (“On the shells of the Great Patriotic War exploded ‘black diggers’ of the Vitebsk region”), Vitbichi online, 24 November 2014.
[3] “В КОБРИНЕ ДВОЕ МУЖЧИН ПОДОРВАЛИСЬ НА ГРАНАТЕ” (“N Kobrin Two Men Were Blown Up By Grenade”), 5MIN.BY, 25 April 2012.
[4] CCW Protocol V Article 10 Report, Form E, 24 March 2014.
[5] “Resolution of the Council of Ministers, Republic of Belarus,” N 1589, 31 October 2001.
[6] Ibid., N 1126, 29 June 2010.