US embassy cable - 04QUITO2552

UNCLAS QUITO 002552 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR PM/WRA: KATHERINE BAKER 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: KHDP, PREL, PGOV, EC, PE 
SUBJECT: FEW U.S.-MANUFACTURED LAND MINES IN ECUADOR 
 
REF: SECSTATE 200879 
 
1.  In response to Reftel, Poloff September 20 contacted 
Guillermo Leal, chief of the OAS Humanitarian Demining (HD) 
mission in Ecuador.  Leal noted the only U.S.-produced land 
mine found in Ecuador was the M18A1 Claymore device.  The GoE 
had destroyed seven in-stock Claymores in 2001, Leal 
recalled; he believed the Ecuadorian Army maintained at least 
ten more in its warehouses.  They were not subject to 
destruction under Ecuador's Ottawa Convention 
responsibilities, since the weapons were to be fired manually 
by GoE soldiers, not left unattended, to be triggered by the 
enemy. 
 
2.  Since the OAS HD program's inception three years ago, 
sappers had uncovered no/no U.S.-produced land mines.  For 
comparison, the total of mines cleared in Ecuador, including 
those uncovered in the Army's own efforts in the late 1990s, 
was 4438.  Most were of Chilean, Brazilian, or former Soviet 
Union fabrication.  According to the Army's own minefield 
documentation, however, there are 39 pressure-triggered 
Claymores remaining in Ecuador's remote Morona-Santiago 
province, where HD operations soon will commence. 
KENNEY