Worldwide, some two million new landmines are sown annually in combat areas like Rwanda, Chechnya, and Bosnia. Even more discouraging, one comprehensive report on the problem states that devices removed from 400 mine fields in Croatia were stockpiled for reuse by warring factions, a situation beyond the power of the observing U.N. team to prohibit. In response to this seemingly insurmountable situation, some 200 independent organizations around the world are pushing for immediate cessation of manufacture, sale, transfer, and implanting of these assault weapons that continue their threat long after hostilities have ended. This, the groups believe, is an international problem requiring a global solution. Of more immediate concern is rehabilitation assistance for the hundreds of thousands who have been maimed by landmines.
Survival is difficult enough in most developing countries.
Minus hands, arms, legs, or eyesight, it is a virtual death sentence. However, the countries with the greatest number of injured usually are the least able to afford widespread medical care, much less functional prosthetic devices. One glaring example of need is Vietnam, which has an estimated 200,000 postwar amputees. As victors, the People's Army took care of its own, leaving most of the Saigon Government's veterans without artificial limbs. These injured veterans, as well as countless women and children dismembered by landmines, need prosthetic treatment in order to hope for any kind of a future.