Graca Machel, wife of Mozambique's late president and specialist on the impact of land mines on children, said at today's conference that child victims, especially in isolated rural areas, die before they can be treated or even recorded as victims by government and aid agencies.
Children suffer the most and for the longest.
That's why we need a ban on anti-personnel land mines. Children who lose limbs to land mine explosions face potentially graver problems than adult victims. Rapid growth spurts mean that children may need two or three amputations after an injury and to be fitted with up to two prosthetics each year. In Afghanistan an estimated 30 percent of land mine victims are children, while in some parts of Angola that figure is as high as 50 percent. President Joaquim Chissano of Mozambique also addressed the packed conference on the opening day, along with Jody Williams, Coordinator of the International Campaign to Ban Land Mines, and Graca Machel.