UN Geneva - Multimedia Newsroom : UNIDIR Press conference: Landmine Monitor 2025 report

Good morning and welcome to the global launch of the Landmine Monitor 2025 reports.

Thank you for joining us today.

My name is Fifi Eduafo, senior Researcher with UNI Desk Conventional arms and ammunitions programme.

I coordinate the pillar on preventing armed conflict and armed violence.

It's an honour to introduce a 27th edition of the Landmine Monitor on behalf of Unidare.

Unidare has a long standing value close collaboration with international campaign of banned Landmines and Cluster Munitions Coalition, regularly hosting the launches of their annual Landmine Monitor and Cluster Munitions reports establishing 1998.

The Landmine Monitor is a pioneering civil society initiative that provides comprehensive reporting on landmine ban, with particular attention to the universalisation and implementation of the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty.

More broadly, it assesses the international community's response to the humanitarian consequences of landmine cluster munitions and other explosives.

Remnants of war.

The 2025 edition offers a global overview of the development in landmine band policy use, production, transfer, stockpiling and destruction during 2024 to 2025.

It also presents updated data on communication casualties and efforts to mitigate harm through clearance, survey risk, education and victim assistance.

This year's report documents recent use of anti personal minds by Myanmar and Russia, as well as by Iran and North Korea.

It also notes a progress in treaty universalization, with two new States Parties joining in 2025, plus, regrettably, 5 states are in the process of withdrawing.

Casualty figures for 2024 are higher than previous years, with civilian disproportionately affected and particularly in countries where mines were recently deployed.

The global number of victim continue to rise, yet resources and services for assistance remain insufficient to meet their growing needs.

Later this week, the ICBL and UNIDEL would participate in the Man Ban Treaty 22nd Meeting of State Parties, opening today in Geneva under Japan's Presidency.

This meeting provides an opportunity to highlight positive development whilst addressing serious challenges including funding gaps, treaty renewals, renewed mine use and production and the devastating impact on civilians.

I am now pleased to introduce 4 civil society experts who played central roles in producing this year's report.

Yeshua Musa, Pusuan researcher with banned Policy team, would address treaty universalization, new use, production transfer progress, and stockpile destruction.

Katherine Atkins, editor for Mine Action and a train.

The mining experts would present findings on contamination and efforts to reduce impact through clearance and risk education.

Lauren Percy, Impacting Lead Leader, would highlight the human toll of mines and explosive remnants of war, including casualty and victim assistance.

Root Bottomley Action Mine Action Funding Research Lead would discuss national and international resources for mine action.

I would also like to acknowledge the presence of Charles Butcher, Communication and Media Manager and Elia Barrow, Projects Manager for the Monitor.

They are available to respond to your questions if need be.

With that, I am pleased to give the floor to Yoshua to begin the experts presentations.

[Other language spoken]

From Geneva or wherever you might be joining this press conference from, your continued coverage of our findings is incredibly important to us.

So thank you for being here or being online.

You don't need me to tell you that this has been a very difficult year for the ban.

Oh, by the way, on the slides, we should be on the status of the mine Ban Treaty.

I can't see them if they're on my screen.

[Other language spoken]

About one year ago today at the United Nations General Assembly, the highest number of countries ever to vote in favour of the Mine Ban Treaty voted in favour of it.

The UN Secretary General launched A humanitarian disarmament campaign with a special focus on strengthening international compliance with the Mine Ban Treaty.

94% of the African Union, the Organisation of American Straits and the Pacific Island Forum have joined the treaty.

97% of NATO, 100% of the European Union as of this minute are party to the Mine Ban Treaty.

However, simultaneous with this relatively positive picture of our 25 year old Convention, a few states have taken actions that concretely threaten the continued health of the Convention and the norm that it represents.

Ukraine has claimed it can suspend the implementation of the Mine Ban Treaty while using anti personnel mines and acquiring stockpiles from the United States and possibly producing some five Baltic countries.

Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland are in the process of withdrawing from the treaty and there are serious allegations of Cambodia using anti personnel mines along its border with Thailand.

Both states parties to the Mine Ban Treaty for Ukraine's fantasy suspension, they are trying to do something that is not allowed under international humanitarian law and therefore we do not accept this legal procedure.

The Mine Ban Treaty is clearly intended to apply during armed conflict.

Article One of the Convention prohibits use under any circumstances.

Under any circumstances is taken directly from the 1992 Convention on Chemical Weapons and it has an established meeting.

Under international law, Article 19 prohibits reservations to the Convention or any unilateral exemptions.

This topic will be under discussion at this meeting of States parties.

Withdrawal is a legal process under the convention, and these five states have argued that Russians invasion of Ukraine led to a fundamental change in their security circumstances.

They are not currently involved in armed conflict, which makes their withdrawal legal.

However, they are deeply The withdrawals are deeply disturbing because it reflects a retreat from the norms that the Mine Ban Treaty have established.

The allegations of Cambodia's use are deeply disturbing.

They have been made by Thailand and both countries are parties to the Mine Ban Treaty.

Thailand has provided credible evidence of the use of anti personnel minds by Cambodia on disputed territory under the control of its forces, causing limb loss in several Thai soldiers.

Thailand has pursued remedy under Articles 8.1 and 8.2 of the Convention.

This will also be a topic of conversation at this meeting.

[Other language spoken]

This section is a bit smaller than previous years, but nonetheless disturbing.

Extensive use was documented by Myanmar and Russia, both which are not states parties to this Convention.

Two other states not parties, Iran and North Korea, were reported to use land mines along their borders, Iran on its border with Pakistan, North Korea and the DMZ between it and South Korea.

Since February of 2022, the Monitor has reported at least thirteen types of anti personnel mines used by Russia and Ukraine.

Since late 2023, the Monitor found Russian forces posting photographic images online indicating use of at least four types of anti personnel mines and two types of anti vehicle mines delivered by drone.

Much more information is in the Landmine Monitor report in front of you starting on page 20.

Also since 2022 the Monitor has been reporting new use of anti personnel mines by Ukrainian forces.

Like the International Criminal Court, the Monitor is using open source intelligence to identify use.

This includes use of new minds of a type of unknown origin delivered by drones.

Also, photographic images posted online by both Ukrainian and Russian sources claim that artillery delivered Adam mines, which were supplied by the US in November of 2024, have been used in combat.

The monitor has not been able to determine the precise location of this use, but more information is available starting on page 23 of the report this year.

Extremely uncomfortable for us is the credible allegations of new use of land mines by two states parties to the convention, Cambodia and Ukraine.

In the case of Cambodia, significant amount of evidence has been presented by Thailand to support its allegation that since mid year Cambodia has been undertaking military action on its disputed borders including the laying of new anti personnel land mines which in seven specific incident caused injury to 20 soldiers on patrol and limb loss for seven of those soldiers.

Thailand has requested a visit by the newly established ASEAN Observer Mission to the site of the 10th November incident.

The mission found in its report that the mines had been freshly laid.

The Landmine Monitor itself undertook A2 day fact finding mission at two of the incident sites on the border.

Thailand has now raised this issue and much more information is starting on page 17 of the report in front of you.

Non state armed groups do continue to use landmines, mostly on a sporadic basis in the Maghrib region and on a more widespread basis in Myanmar.

Slide on production and transfer please.

The number of states not party to the Mine Ban Treaty identified by the Landmine Monitor as producers has not changed much in the last year.

Most of them are not actively producing but have not renounced production.

In the case of Ukraine, it received 2 shipments of anti personnel landmines from the United States in November of 2024 as noted under USE.

We have indications in social media of combatants themselves that drone delivered devices which function like an anti personnel mine are being produced in Ukraine or for Ukraine.

We are still unsure of the provenance of these 3D printed AP mines used by the Ukraine, but we expect to find more details during 2026.

The slide on stockpile destruction please.

For 2025, the picture remains much the same as in previous years.

While millions of mines have been destroyed under the convention and almost half of all UN member states have completed stockpile destruction under the convention, still 2 states parties are way overdue.

In the case of Greece, we are hoping that they will update us on their stockpile destruction during this coming meeting.

In the case of Ukraine, their stockpile is subject to the effects of armed conflict, and it is not possible for them to determine what's left.

And it's unlikely that that will happen before the end of the war.

That is the end of my presentation.

I turn it over to Catherine.

Thank you very much.

[Other language spoken]

So Oman earlier this year is the first state party to complete clearance of anti personal minds since 2020 with only five other state parties that have completed clearance since 2014.

This includes Burundi, Mozambique, Algeria, Chile and UK, whereby Mozambique and Algeria still have residual contamination left and Mozambique is also suspected to be contaminated with improvised mines and also the UK destroyed some newly discovered individual single mines in the Falkland Islands.

The situation in terms of contaminated states, with the exception of Oman who complete the clearance presents itself the same as last year at least.

At least 57 States and other areas including 32 state parties are contaminated by anti personal minds, including 25 state parties that are believed or known to also be contaminated with improvised minds.

We also still have 7 state parties with massive contamination.

Nothing changed there since last year.

[Other language spoken]

These are Afghanistan, Bosnia Herzegovina, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Iraq, Turkey and Ukraine, whereby in Ukraine the situation remains kind of blurry with no reliable calculation of the total extent of contamination with mines.

As the conflict is ongoing, the good news is that more than half of the affected states parties succeeded in decreasing contamination in 2024 mostly through non-technical survey, technical survey and clearance, but partly also through desk assessments that resulted in the clean up of inaccurate data entries in data information management systems.

[Other language spoken]

Talking about clearance or more broader land release, which includes survey methods as well.

The progress in 2024 can be described as somewhat of a mixed bag with good news but also with some bad news.

As mentioned previously.

On a positive note, state parties released over 1100 square kilometres and destroyed more than 105,000 mines in 2024.

This is an increase of more than 420 square kilometres compared with last year.

However, this includes a large amount of land released by Ethiopia through a general clean up of their database.

Overall, without taking Ethiopia into account, less land was released in 2024 than in 2023, and in particular, less land was cleared than in PRE in the previous year, whereby funding limitations but also work in difficult terrain and complex environments were the most often mentioned as reasons for this degrees.

The clearance champions of 2024 are Cambodia, Croatia and Yemen, which cleared the most land of the state parties.

We also had nine affected state parties that did not release any land or did not formally report on any land release.

This includes Argentina, Charles, Cyprus, Eritrea, Guinea, Bissau, Nisha, Nigeria, Palestine and Sudan.

Whereby for Argentinia, we have to say it's simply because they do not acknowledge the clearance completion by UK in the Falkland Islands in 2024 and 202522 state parties have requested extensions to their clearance deadlines, 13 of them in 2025 alone.

This also includes Burkina Faso, which did not previously have clearance obligations, but a knowledge the presence of improvised mines on its territory through the Article 7 transparency reporting.

So to summarise, despite overall positive progress, the aspirational goal of completing clearance by 2025 remains far from being achieved, signalling that the vision of a mind free, mind free world has not been matched by adequate resources and efforts on the ground.

20-30 seems indeed to be the new 2025.

[Other language spoken]

Equally important as land release is risk education to warn the population from the threat.

Risk education was conducted in nearly all state parties with clearance obligations, including more state parties that provided disaggregated beneficiary data with their annual transparency reporting.

This reflects a positive trend since 2019 when only 8 affected state parties submitted sufficiently disaggregated data of their risk education activities.

Less progress has been seen regarding the submission of detailed costed multi year plans for risk education as part of the state party's extension requests.

Of the 22 state parties that submitted a request in 2024 and 2025, only 7 provided a multi year plan for risk education Angola, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Colombia, Ethiopia, Quinia, Bisao and Serbia.

In terms of the target group and the groups at risk, men and boys remain the most exposed to the danger of mines and explosive remnants of war, as they are more likely to take intentional risks due to economic necessity than other groups.

In terms of methodologies, despite consistently low funding allocated to risk education, we see really good progress and trends.

This includes more efforts to analyse behaviour change and barriers to it, more targeted use of different methods and means for particular at risk groups, more efforts to be truly inclusive, but also broader efforts to combine risk education with other initiatives to increase vulnerable communities resilience, such as through conflict preparedness and protection, for example.

And that's me, Don, I think you're next, Lauren.

Thank you, thank you, Catherine.

So talking about the situation of casualties from mines and explosive remnants of war in 2024, because our data is basically always looking at a complete data set for the previous calendar year, 2024 saw the highest number of casualties since 2020.

So seeing as the Mine Ban Treaty looks at five year periods in the five year action plans, this is quite a concerning change considering that the promise of the Mine Ban Treaty is to end the casualties and suffering caused by mines.

And so in 2024, there was over 6000 mine and ERW casualties.

Almost 2000 of those people were killed, over 4000 were injured and those casualties occurred in 52 states, 51 states in another area and 36 of those were party to the Mine Ban Treaty.

But it was actually in states not party to the My Bank Treaty where most casualties were recorded.

In Myanmar, which had the highest number of casualties for the second year, there were over 2000 casualties.

And in Syria, which has had extremely high numbers of casualties for many years only to have been surpassed by Myanmar in the last two years, there was over 1000 casualties.

Now just say on the situation with Syria, although we look at the previous calendar year, we do keep track of what's happening in the world and the situation in both Myanmar and Syria remain alarming.

When it comes to casualties, in the case of Syria, there has certainly been an increase in casualties since the fall of the Assad regime in early December 2024.

So there are, it looks like there are at least 1500 casualties in Syria in that time.

Significant numbers of casualties will also record the in States parties, Afghanistan and Ukraine.

And in a number of countries, there was over 100 casualties recorded, sometimes from legacy contamination and sometimes from the use of improvised mines, which had been more recently used.

I'll go to the next slide, please.

So consistent with the reason for the Maya Ban Treaty coming into existence itself, the ratio of civilian casualties remained extremely high.

Civilians made-up 90% of casualties in 2024 and children remained a significant portion of all casualties.

40 sorry almost half, basically 46% of civilian casualties where the age was recorded.

In the countries with the higher numbers of casualties such as Myanmar, Syria and Afghanistan, the highest numbers of child casualties were found.

But to put some things into perspective and, and you'll find this in some of the other reporting products, for example the factory on children and land mines in Afghanistan, 77%.

So over 3/4 of all casualties were children, which is horrific.

Improvised mines which are often used in ongoing conflicts, particularly in the Lake Chad area, but in many countries including those with high numbers of casualties that I mentioned were causing the most casualties and that's been so for over a decade.

But manufactured anti personnel mines have been causing an increasing number of casualties in this five year.

And the number of casualties from anti personnel mines tripled by 2024.

So this being the highest number since 2011, I think goes to show what a significant problem that still is when it comes to assisting the victims.

If we go to the next slide, please.

[Other language spoken]

In States parties to the Mind Band Treaty, there is a strong commitment to make good on obligations to victims by providing rehabilitation, economic support and social and psychological support.

But these these commitments have not been matched by the funding and resources required.

So what I've seen is although there are many efforts and there have been, for example, new rehabilitation centres built, there are new technologies for prostheses which are coming out.

Yet in many countries, because of conflict, insecurity and economic crises, victim assistance has deteriorated.

And in some cases things that were available weren't available anymore in 2024.

And this seems to be continuing trend in some countries due to conflict, particularly Ukraine, Palestine, a massive rise in the number of amputees has drawn on very limited existing resources and made the situation very difficult for everyone, including minor ERW survivors.

I think I'd hand over to Ruth on the funding there.

[Other language spoken]

So I'm going to talk about mine action funding specifically for 2024, although I will also mention at the end some of the developments that have been happening in 2025.

So for the second year in a row in 2024, annual global funding for mine actions surpassed 1 billion.

So this includes global figures for clearance of land mines, cluster munitions and ERW, explosive remnants of war, and both national and international contributions.

More national funding to mine action programmes was reported in 2024.

26 affected states contributed around 30% of global funding.

But funding by affected states remains very inconsistent and so it's difficult to really draw any conclusions on trends.

International donors provided around $761 million to mine action activities, which was a small decrease on the amount provided in 2023.

However, as in previous years, the majority of mine action funding was provided by only a handful of donors.

the US, Germany, and the EU are the largest 3 donors, and they provided 62% of total international funding in 2024.

Ukraine remained the top recipient of international funding for the third year in a row, so it received around 33% of international funds, although this was also a decrease on the amount it received in 2023.

As in previous years, and we have reported on consistently, several state parties, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, continue to struggle to obtain international funds, which effects their abilities to meet Article 5 clearance deadlines as soon as possible.

State parties Chad, Guinea Bissau, Mauritania and Niger received minimal or no international assistance in 2024.

This again highlights the need for and the importance of a mechanism such as a voluntary trust fund to support state parties to achieve their clearance objectives under the main Ban Treaty.

At this meeting this week, we're hoping to hear a report on a review conducted by a committee that was set up under the CM REAP Anchor Action Plan to look at the feasibility of such a voluntary trust fund.

If we go to the next slide, please.

So looking at where the funding went, according to sector, the majority of funding, around 75%, went to clearance programmes, although this also includes programmes which include capacity building, risk education and victim assistance, but where clearance is the largest component.

If we look at dedicated funding, international funding for victim assistance decreased by 23% compared to 2023 and represented only 5% of all international funding.

And 66% of this only went to four states, Afghanistan, Syria, Ukraine and Yemen.

And if we remember from Lauren, he noted that 40 states actually do have responsibilities for victims.

So there's a a large gap and there's a need to increase targeted funding for victim assistance to ensure that all survivors get the support that they need.

Direct funding to risk education also represented only 2% of total contributions in 2024, despite the increasing need for risk education in conflict zones where clearance is often not possible, and as Catherine noticed this noted, this also includes other risk education activities such as conflict preparedness and protection.

Also, despite the recognition by humanitarian actors that there needs to be more focus on national capacity building and localisation, as also reflected in the CM REAP Anchor Action Plan, in 2024, only 2% of funds went directly to national NGOs working in clearance education and risk education and victim assistance and support for national mine action institutions also dropped to 5% of total contributions compared to 10% the previous year.

So just briefly to mention on the developments we've seen in 2025.

As we know, the US imposed A sector wide funding freeze in the first quarter of the year, stalling some mine action programmes and terminating others.

And this is comes also at the same time when other major donors, including some state parties to this treaty, are also considering scaling back their mine action funding to divert other priorities including increased defence spending.

This has really highlighted the vulnerability of mine action funding with its dependence on a few major donors, including the US.

It's likely that the impacts of these developments will become clearer in coming years, But as a campaign, it's crucial for us to keep the pressure up to ensure that both donors and affected states work to address these funding gaps and maintain strong international cooperation.

And just to note, we have actually produced a fact sheet that is looking at some of the impacts of the US funding as known at the moment.

So I hope you will be able to see that as well.

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much panellists for your insightful presentation.

Having listened to the presentation from the panellists, I would like to open the floor now for questions.

I invite both participant here in the room and also those joining us from online to ask their questions or provide their comments.

So, yeah, good morning, everybody.

Thank you for this briefing.

Olivia LaPorte from Reuters news Agency.

[Other language spoken]

Just starting with the example from Syria.

I was just wondering, Lorraine, if you could spell out why there's been an increase in casualties since the fall of Assad?

And I just also wanted to clarify that the figure, figure of 1500 casualties, what was the timeline for that?

And does that include deaths and injuries?

And secondly, just on the note of of funding, I appreciate that the focus of the report is in 2024, but you mentioned some indications from 2025 projecting ahead to 2026.

[Other language spoken]

I know you've mentioned some parties to the agreement have signalled they will row back on funding.

But if you're able to perhaps give an impression of how much because from where I can see the the funding cutbacks, you've mentioned 5% decrease in 2024 on mine action, 23% on victim assistance.

But are we expecting much bigger numbers in terms of funding decrease into next year?

[Other language spoken]

So Lauren 1st and then Ruth, thank you.

[Other language spoken]

So regarding Syria, so that the time frame for those casualties is from the 8th of December to basically a week ago, the mine action area of responsibility which is part of the UN cluster system has been very diligent in collecting casualty reports basically daily and releasing weekly reports.

And that includes both people killed and injured, many children amongst the casualties.

And that is because many of the casualties are families returning to either areas where they lived or just passing through unknown areas on the way for return, both refugees returning and internally displaced people returning.

So it's very much a case of there being more casualties once the peace has occurred, which is not uncommon with mines.

And I think also contextualises some of the other situations where we see conflicts where there may be many more casualties in the future because of similar returns.

Yeah, I think that's covers that.

[Other language spoken]

So regarding funding, it's difficult to say exactly how much we expect funding to be reduced by, but the US has been a consistent funder of mine action for many years.

So in the last five years, for example, it's provided 1/3 of international funding.

We also know that there are several state parties that it funds where it funds more than 50% of their total funding contribution.

And the evidence that we have so far is that certain state parties are going to be more impacted than others.

So we know that several programmes have been terminated, for example, in Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Colombia, Tajikistan, Zimbabwe and a few others.

And so those countries are probably going to see more impact than others because those programmes terminated close, no more funding.

They were sometimes at the end of a contract that they expected a new contract to be signed.

I think that there will be, it's very difficult to say what the impact will be on victim assistance because often it is not disaggregated from more broader assistance to disability.

But we do believe that there has been quite a large impact for victim assistance.

And again, we'll be able to report, report hopefully more accurately on that next year as we begin to see some of these developments happening.

I don't know if you've got anything to add to that, Lauren.

[Other language spoken]

It also just strikes me this kind of, you know, heading into 2026, we may or may not see a ceasefire in Ukraine.

You've already outlined the the usage of of of mines by Russia and Ukraine.

We've also had the situation in Syria increasing number of casualties, also the situation in Gaza, numerous conflict zones.

It seems like the kind of usage is increasing, the concern is increasing and yet the funding is decreasing.

I mean, how concerning is that and what kind of impact can that have, You know, all these big conflicts that might, some of which might be coming to a more permanent end heading into into next year.

I'll make a start on this.

So though others might have had some comments as well, I think it's really concerning.

I mean, we, we know that a lot of the, the donors who are reducing funding are doing that because they're increasing defence spending, the UK, for example, my own country.

So there is, you know, a significant increase in spending on defence.

There's a lowering of aid budgets generally, which includes, of course mine action.

We know that obviously in the last three years since the outbreak of conflict in Ukraine, Ukraine has received the majority of funding, which has had an impact on other affected States and that they've seen less funding because obviously there is a pot and and that's shared out.

So it's it's likely that all states could see a decline in funding.

I guess there will still be somewhere there will be an influx that, you know, potentially if conflict does finish in Ukraine, Gaza, you know, there will be initial funding going to those countries.

But you know, the clean up process, this is the problem.

[Other language spoken]

It takes years and years and years.

And so it's sustaining that funding for state parties who have been affected in this way.

[Other language spoken]

I don't know if you've got any.

[Other language spoken]

Does that answer your question?

[Other language spoken]

I'm Alicia Gar from the Spanish News Agency.

[Other language spoken]

Why do you think Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland are trying to leave?

Or have they provided any reasons?

And also how exactly is Ukraine trying to suspend the treaty If you have observed any specific actions and when this started regarding to Colombia, if you could tell us which armed groups are you seeing anti personal minds and where?

And also regarding to Cuba, you have included this country in the countries that develop, produce or acquire mines.

If you could tell us a little bit more about what is Cuba doing and how many mines is producing or acquiring and what's the cost of these mines?

[Other language spoken]

Well, the quick answer for Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and and Poland and Finland on why are they leaving you?

[Other language spoken]

However, I was at the UN General Assembly for a couple of weeks last month and I had a discussions with all of them and they were othering their decision.

They said we didn't leave.

Russia forced us to leave.

They have repeatedly cited the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Has a changed security environment for them.

So those are some things that they've said publicly or to me when I was meeting with their representatives at the General Assembly in New York.

As for the suspension, the Ukraine has said that they have the ability to suspend the convention under the Vienna Convention on Conventions.

However, Article 72, if I'm not mistaken of that convention, says that it does not apply in cases of armed conflict.

And for the reasons that I outlined earlier in my my presentation, we do not consider a suspension a legitimate act under this convention because of Article 1 and Article 19 of the convention.

I, I didn't hear your question on armed groups.

It, it went by a little too fast.

I'm sorry.

Yes, I was asking because you mentioned Colombia.

So I went, I wanted to know if you know which groups specifically are using anti personal minds and where in which regions of Colombia they are using them.

I don't have the particular departments of Columbia in front of me, so I I, I can't give you the specifics.

We do have such information in our Columbia profile which will be online relatively soon.

The Elni know is one of the groups that was identified a few FARC remnants and there may have been another group.

I would have to consult that profile.

I don't have that information at our fingertips, but it is there.

And if you can't find it, please write us and I will make sure that you get that information.

And also on Cuba, if if you could specify if Cuba is developing, producing or acquiring mines and how many and what's is the cost, economic cost of this?

[Other language spoken]

For the band policy report, we have no information that suggests that Cube is acquiring new anti personnel landmines from anywhere or using them anywhere.

They do have past use minefields around the Guantanamo Bay area.

That's all the information that I have on Cuba and that's remained relatively static for many, many years now.

Any more questions from the room online?

[Other language spoken]

I don't know if the panellists have anything else to add to what is already been said before we conclude.

[Other language spoken]

I'd just like to add something to the situation with funding, particularly funding for victim assistance, because I hadn't said it in the presentation, though.

It is one of our findings that while there's clearly a decrease in funding, particularly affected by the US in countries where there's conflict, not only is it the the conflict on the whole which disrupts victim assistance, but we see that there is often attacks directly on the health system itself.

So in addition to the probable increase in casualties when there's a peace, there's also going to be just less of a health and rehabilitation system left in many of these countries.

And these attacks are very well documented.

So to add that.

[Other language spoken]

OK, So I don't see any questions online or in the room.

So I would like to conclude.

But before I do, I would like to briefly recap today's key points.

This year's findings shows both progress and some serious challenges.

Progress has to do with new state parties joining, but challenges particularly linked to the issues of Treaty universalisation, renewed mine use, rising civilian casualties and then also the issue of national and local funding, which remains inconsistent.

Together, these insights remind us of the urgent need for sustained commitment, resources and cooperation to address the humanitarian impact of landmine and explosive remnants of war.

I would like to at this time sincerely say a big thank you to Joshua, Catherine, Lauren and Ruth for their insightful contributions and and presentation this morning.

And I'd like to extend my gratitude to those who join us in the room and also online throughout the briefing.

Thank you very much.

UNIDIR Press conference: Landmine Monitor 2025 report - 01 December2025