Cluster bombs dropped more than 30 years ago in Quang Binh Province continue to threaten the lives and limbs of children unable to play in their own garden, with the contaminated land making it difficult to grow rice crops and vegetables in an economy that relies on home grown produce to supplement incomes. One affected family explains how MAG Vietnam helped them look forward to building new and safer lives.
"We do not play in the garden," said 13-year-old Vo Thi Trang, "because my mother says there are many bombs and mines still out there."
As well as the normal pressures of bringing up four children aged between 10 and 16, Vo Ngoc Quyen and Dinh Thi Huong, both 44, also had to live with the fear that one of them would accidently set off one of the many items of unexploded ordnance (UXO) left behind from Vietnam’s conflicts during the 20th century.
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| Dinh Thi Huong with three of her four children: (left-right) Vo Thi Trang, 13, Vo Thi Thom, 16, and Vo Thi Thuy, 14. In July, MAG removed and destroyed three cluster bombs that had lain in the family’s garden for more than three decades |
And not just to children. The soil around Tu Loan village is very poor and sandy, explained Mrs Huong, but farmers were afraid of digging deeper into the ground to improve the soil quality because the area was contaminated by all sorts of bombs.
"The fear of hitting UXO makes it even more difficult to grow rice crops and vegetables. I did not dare plant a garden in the plot outside my house because I was afraid for myself and my children."
Such a situation put severe restraints on the family’s livelihood, forced to rely on the small salary that her husband brings in as a driver with the Truong Tinh Company to feed, clothe and send the children to school.
MAG Vietnam’s Mine Action Team No. 2 (MAT 2), funded by Adopt-A-Minefield, spent all of July in Quang Hung Commune. The 11 male and female technicians, supported by medics and drivers, conducted a house-to-house search of the villages of Hung Loc and Tu Loan for all known and reported UXO.
As part of their work, MAT 2 removed three cluster bombs from Mrs Huong’s garden. She now plans to use the plot outside her house to grow vegetables to feed her children and maybe even sell for profit.
She told MAG: "I am very happy that my family are no longer in danger and grateful to them for removing these bombs from my garden as well as our village and Hung Loc. We are no longer afraid and looking forward to building new and safer lives."
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| Technicians from MAG’s Mine Action Team No. 2 using a large loop detector in the investigation of some reported buried items in Vietnam |
By the end of the month the team had visited 625 houses, conducted 124 explosive ordnance disposal tasks and destroyed 318 items of UXO – crucial in helping an economy that relies on home-grown produce to supplement incomes.
The area, which Mrs Huong says was known for its beautiful big trees before the war, was devastated during the 1960s and 70s: "I cannot remember which years were the worst, I just remember the bombs falling and being afraid."
Cluster bombs are the most common – and one of the most dangerous types – of UXO found in Vietnam as they take a long time to degrade and remain potentially lethal for many years after they are dropped.