SIEM REAP, Cambodia: The UN Secretary-General on Monday slammed the “renewed threat” of anti-personnel land mines, days after the United States said it would supply the weapons to Ukrainian forces battling Russia’s invasion.
In remarks sent to a conference in Cambodia to review progress on the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Treaty, UN chief Antonio Guterres hailed the work of clearing and destroying land mines across the world.
“But the threat remains. This includes the renewed use of anti-personnel mines by some of the Parties to the Convention, as well as some Parties falling behind in their commitments to destroy these weapons,” he said in the statement.
He called on the 164 signatories — which include Ukraine but not Russia or the United States — to “meet their obligations and ensure compliance to the Convention.”
Guterres’ remarks were delivered by UN Under-Secretary General Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana.
AFP has contacted her office and a spokesman for Guterres to ask if the remarks were directed specifically at Ukraine.
The Ukrainian team at the conference did not respond to AFP questions about the US land mine supplies.
Washington’s announcement last week that it would send anti-personnel land mines to Kyiv was immediately criticized by human rights campaigners.
The outgoing US administration is aiming to give Ukraine an upper hand before President-elect Donald Trump enters office.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the mines “very important” to halting Russian attacks.
The conference is being held in Cambodia, which was left one of the most heavily bombed and mined countries in the world after three decades of civil war from the 1960s.
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet told the conference his country still needs to clear over 1,600 square kilometers (618 square miles) of contaminated land that is affecting the lives of more than one million people.
Around 20,000 people have been killed in Cambodia by land mines and unexploded ordnance since 1979, and twice as many have been injured.
The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) said on Wednesday that at least 5,757 people had been casualties of land mines and explosive remnants of war across the world last year, 1,983 of whom were killed.
Civilians made up 84 percent of all recorded casualties, it said.

UNITED NATIONS: The deadliest place for women is at home and 140 women and girls on average were killed by an intimate partner or family member per day last year, two UN agencies reported Monday.
Globally, an intimate partner or family member was responsible for the deaths of approximately 51,100 women and girls during 2023, an increase from an estimated 48,800 victims in 2022, UN Women and the UN Office of Drugs and Crime said.
The report released on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women said the increase was largely the result of more data being available from countries and not more killings.
But the two agencies stressed that “Women and girls everywhere continue to be affected by this extreme form of gender-based violence and no region is excluded.” And they said, “the home is the most dangerous place for women and girls.”
The highest number of intimate partner and family killings was in Africa – with an estimated 21,700 victims in 2023, the report said. Africa also had the highest number of victims relative to the size of its population — 2.9 victims per 100,000 people.
There were also high rates last year in the Americas with 1.6 female victims per 100,000 and in Oceania with 1.5 per 100,000, it said. Rates were significantly lower in Asia at 0.8 victims per 100,000 and Europe at 0.6 per 100,000.
According to the report, the intentional killing of women in the private sphere in Europe and the Americas is largely by intimate partners.
By contrast, the vast majority of male homicides take place outside homes and families, it said.
“Even though men and boys account for the vast majority of homicide victims, women and girls continue to be disproportionately affected by lethal violence in the private sphere,” the report said.
“An estimated 80 percent of all homicide victims in 2023 were men while 20 percent were women, but lethal violence within the family takes a much higher toll on women than men, with almost 60 percent of all women who were intentionally killed in 2023 being victims of intimate partner/family member homicide,” it said.
The report said that despite efforts to prevent the killing of women and girls by countries, their killings “remain at alarmingly high levels.”
“They are often the culmination of repeated episodes of gender-based violence, which means they are preventable through timely and effective interventions,” the two agencies said.