Executive Summary
BACKGROUND AND PROJECT OVERVIEW
The government, the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), and non state armed groups used landmines in Sudan during more than 20 years of civil conflict. In June 2003 when the Survey Action Center conducted an Advance Survey Mission at the request of the United Nations Mine Action program in Sudan, landmines were perceived to be a major but largely unknown problem in Sudan. In addition to the obstacles from the lack of a peace agreement at the time there was insufficient information on the landmine problem to develop a national strategic plan to reduce the overall threat and risk.
Sudan presents many challenges to humanitarian and development planners. It is the tenth largest country in the world and is largely lacking roads and modern modes of transportation. Until recently, information flowed slowly and often inaccurately to the national authorities or the UN Mine Action Office. Further, the nature of the conflict in Sudan meant that records were rarely kept, and those that may have existed were often inaccurate or out of date. As a result, information was not available to comprehensively quantify the extent of mine contamination in Sudan at the time of the Advance Survey Mission in June 2003 and the full impact mines had on the life of the local population. Estimates of the problem at the time ranged from one-third of the country were impacted by mines to roads and garrison towns in 21 of the 25 states. The DanChurchAid (DCA) and the European Commission-funded Sudan Landmine and Information Response Initiative (SLIRI) were the major operators at the time.