Mozambique declares itself free of landmines
Mozambique has declared itself free of landmines, ending two decades of work to rid the country of a legacy of war that killed or maimed thousands of people, many of them civilians.
A British charity, the HALO Trust, said on Thursday that it had cleared more than 171,000 landmines from 1,100 minefields in Mozambique since 1993 and had finally destroyed the last known mine.
"I have honour to declare Mozambique as a country free of the threat of landmines," Foreign Affairs Minister Oldemiro Baloi said at a ceremony in the capital Maputo.
The exact human toll caused by landmines in the country is not known. But a major report in 1994 by Human Rights Watch (HRW) said landmines claimed between 10,000 and 15,000 victims.
HRW estimated 8,000 amputees had received medical treatment and thousands more people had been killed or did not seek medical treatment.
"I am happy that nobody else will end up like me. I am happy because people can carry on their lives without fearing the menace of the landmines," said 29-year-old Jose Chiango, whose right leg was amputated from the knee down after he trod on a mine in an eastern rural district.
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