Enclosed story from the Washington Post is both an inspiration and a
challenge to us all.
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U.S. Activist Receives Nobel Peace Prize for Land Mine Campaign
Home-Based Effort, Via Computer, Led to International Ban in Treaty
By Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 11, 1997; Page A01
The Washington Post
A tenacious American peace activist and the International Campaign to Ban
Landmines that she has run from her home in Vermont were awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize yesterday, a testament to the power of grass-roots
organizations to influence world affairs in the post-Cold War era.
Hours after the announcement, Russia, one of the largest producers of land
mines and previously a holdout from an international accord banning their
use, indicated it may reverse its position and sign a treaty that was
proposed last year by a coalition of groups led by the activist, Jody
Williams, and endorsed last month by 89 countries.
The United States opposes the treaty, which administration officials regard
as ineffective and which the Joint Chiefs of Staff have argued would
endanger the lives of U.S. soldiers in a future war. Williams, 47, who
shared the $1 million prize with the groups that made up the campaign, said
from Vermont yesterday that the Russian announcement "was fabulous and puts
President Clinton further outside the tide of history." She called on
Clinton to reconsider his position.
Both Clinton and Defense Secretary William S. Cohen issued congratulations
to Williams and the anti-land mine coalition yesterday, but did not suggest
that the United States would soften its opposition to the treaty. White
House spokesman Michael McCurry said the president "is absolutely
rock-solid confident that he's got the right approach."
Williams, who was a Washington-based activist against U.S. policies in
Central America in the 1980s, said she had been surprised by the
electrifying speed with which an informal collection of organizations,
which now numbers 250 groups, had succeeded over 14 months in persuading
countries to join a major international treaty, a process that usually
takes years.
The movement to ban land mines started by Williams and other activists
received a major boost when Canadian Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy
announced last year that Canada would begin crafting a treaty and finding
states to support it. At Canada's urging, other countries volunteered to
host the drafting sessions and last month 89 nations adopted the treaty
after final negotiations in Oslo. The treaty is expected to be signed by
100 countries in Ottawa in December.
During the negotiations, representatives of grass-roots organizations sat
side by side with officials from nations working on the treaty. The United
States, which has resisted Canada's initiative and entered the negotiations
at the eleventh hour, attempted to change the pact to allow the use of
mines on the Korean peninsula and of self-destructing mines to protect
antitank minefields. Negotiators rejected both demands.
The treaty calls for the destruction of all mine stockpiles within four
years of ratification and the clearing of minefields within 10 years. There
are an estimated 100 million land mines in the ground in 60 countries.
As an actor on the international diplomatic stage, Williams's campaign has
no precedent. It is an organization in name only, with no staff or office
of its own. Williams has coordinated the campaign largely through e-mail.
Williams said her computer allowed her to keep supporters up to date on the
latest news and to feel the momentum of their movement. "From day one we
recognized that instant communications was critical," she said from
Vermont. "It made people feel they were part of it."
The International Campaign to Ban Landmines "broke all the rules on how
international diplomacy is practiced," said Jessica Mathews, president of
the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. It will be remembered "as a
landmark undertaking," she said.
The campaign's goal is to persuade countries not to use, produce or export
antipersonnel land mines, which kill or maim an estimated 26,000 people a
year, most of them impoverished children and peasants in countries such as
Angola, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Cambodia, Mozambique, El Salvador and
Nicaragua, where mines remain in the ground years after wars have ended.
The idea for a campaign grew out of a conversation among Vietnam Veterans
of America Foundation president Bobby Muller, the head of a German medical
relief organization, Medico International, and Williams,who had spent the
previous 11 years opposing U.S. policy in Central America by leading
fact-finding trips to the region for U.S. opinion makers.
The initial coalition also included groups that had each been working in
the field, providing artificial limbs for land-mine victims, removing
mines, conducting research on producers and users of mines, and documenting
their human cost. Among the groups was the British-based Mines Advisory
Group, the France-based Handicapped International and two other Washington
research groups, Human Rights Watch and Physicians for Human Rights.
In 1992 the groups issued a joint call for an international ban. Its first
major endorsement came from former president Jimmy Carter, but the campaign
was quickly embraced by other major figures, including Pope John Paul II.
The campaign also drew many celebrities to its cause, most notably Diana,
the late Princess of Wales.
By 1993 the campaign included representatives from a variety of countries,
and 50 international groups, including the International Committee of the
Red Cross and many mainstream religious organizations. The campaign gained
attention on Capitol Hill through the efforts of Sen. Patrick J. Leahy
(D-Vt.), who introduced legislation banning mines and lobbied Clinton to
become more interested in the issue.
In 1996, Mark Perry and Muller, both from the Vietnam Veterans of America
Foundation, began lobbying the military, circulating an appeal to 38
retired generals who they believed might favor a ban. They persuaded 14 to
sign a letter endorsing a ban, including the former Desert Storm commander,
Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf. By then, many in the White House and the
Pentagon, who had dismissed the campaign as unrealistic idealism, had taken
notice of the growing public appeal of the issue.
Shortly after the letter signed by the retired generals was published,
Clinton announced a set of unilateral actions, including banning the use of
so-called dumb mines by U.S. troops everywhere but in Korea.
Clinton has said that a worldwide ban such as the one called for under the
treaty will not be effective unless countries such as Russia and China join.
Speaking in Strasbourg, France, yesterday, Russian President Boris Yeltsin
said, "We support and we fully strive to once and for all find a solution,
and sign the convention."
Later, the Russian news agency RIA, quoting Russian delegation sources,
said Yeltsin will announce his decision to join the ban Friday.
Both Williams, who was sleeping in her Vermont cabin, and Muller, who is a
paraplegic from wartime injuries and lives here, were awakened before dawn
yesterday morning by Norwegian television news crews bringing them the news
of the prize.
"A TV woman came into the bedroom just as I was transferring into the
[wheel]chair, threw a bouquet of flowers in my lap and said: `You've won
the Nobel Peace Prize.' Not a bad way to begin the day," Muller said,
laughing.
AN EXPLOSION EVERY 20 MINUTES THE VICTIMS
A person is killed or injured by mines every 20 minutes.
WHO THE VICTIMS ARE
Females over age 15 8.7%
Children under age 15 21.2%
Males over age 15 70.1%
HOW THEY WERE HURT
Fighting 13%
Civilian activity* 83%
Demining 4%
* Includes playing with mines, tending fields and fetching water
THE TREATY
Canada has led the effort for a total ban on antipersonnel land mines.
About 100 nations, but not the United States, are likely to sign in
December. Several key mine producers and users, including China, Russia,
India and Pakistan, have opposed the ban.
Signatories have four years to stop producing mines, must not lay new ones
and have 10 years to clear areas that have been mined. The poorest and most
affected nations will be allowed an extension.
An estimated 100 million land mines are scattered in 60 countries around
the world, and they kill or maim 26,000 people each year, most of them
civilians. An international movement, headed by a coalition that was
awarded the Nobel Peace Prize yesterday, led to agreement on a worldwide
ban on antipersonnel mines.
© Copyright 1997 The Washington Post Company
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