As the destruction caused by explosive remnants of war continues, so too does the Cambodia Campaign to Ban Landmines – but with the compassion that these merciless objects lack. On March 14, that compassion was acknowledged when the Campaign was awarded the 15th Tji Haksoon Justice and Peace Award 2012 for its dedication to the welfare and rights of landmine victims. Cambodia is the fourth most mine-affected country in the world.
Sr Denise Coghlan RSM, Director of the Cambodia Campaign and Director of Jesuit Refugee Service Cambodia, and Song Kosal, Youth Ambassador to the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, accepted the award (a beautiful medal, plaque and US$10 000) at a ceremony in Seoul. The award is named for the deceased Bishop Tji Haksoon, who offered his entire life for peace and justice in South Korea.
“Experience of suffering can lead to depression or it can lead to creative action for justice,” stated Sr Denise in her acceptance speech. “The experience of suffering and misery caused by landmines led us to campaign for a ban on the production, use, export and stockpiling, to campaign that mines be cleared so land is released for agriculture, to campaign that the rights of people disabled by mines be upheld and their needs met.”
Sr Denise and Kosal together with the Chairman of the Tji Haksoon Foundation, Msgr Kim Byung-sang, took the opportunity to urge the South Korean government to stop the manufacture of cluster munitions in the country.
South Korea has not signed the Landmine or Cluster Munitions Treaties and neither has North Korea. Both argue that these are necessary for “defence” in their continuing conflict, and maintain a border littered with landmines. 
The four-day whirlwind visit to Seoul included protests, talks and ceremonies. They protested outside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade one day and entered the very same building and addressed the Foreign and Defence Ministries the next!
The Cambodia Campaign to Ban Landmines team has campaigned around the world since its inception in 1994. They have visited royal families, Emperors, governments and countless landmines survivors. One landmine survivor and campaigner went to the Pope to ask for his support. He agreed, as did many others. In 1997, after having finally achieved the Mine Ban Treaty, this same man rode his wheelchair onto the stage in Oslo and received the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of the campaign.
“Cambodia has reduced the number of new victims dramatically but even one victim is too many,” said Kosal, who lost a leg after stepping on a mine in Battambang — the most heavily mined province in Cambodia — when she was five years old. She told the audience of a tragic incident that occurred just two weeks earlier in northern Cambodia when 11 children were injured in their own classroom when a remnant of war a child found in the school playground exploded. Kosal asked, “Dear people of South Korea, can we work together to build a world of justice and peace for all?”
The award coincides with ‘Lend your Leg’, a global campaign launched on March 1 to put an end, within our lifetime, to the destruction caused by landmines. Around the world, people are standing in solidarity by stepping forward to “Lend a Leg for a mine free world”, with the simple gesture of rolling up their trouser leg.
Launched on the 13th anniversary of the adoption of the International Mine Ban Treaty, the “Lend your Leg” campaign is a month-long call to action for civil society, governments and partners to work diligently together to make a mine-free world a reality.
Juan Pablo, Director of the Colombian Campaign to Ban Landmines and creator of the “Lend your Leg” campaign explains, “Through Lend Your Leg we want to wake the world up and see that by taking part in this simple action and by saying NO MORE to this injustice we truly can put an end to these weapons for good.” The campaign ends on International Mines Awareness Day on April 4.
The “Lend your Leg” campaign began early in Cambodia when Japan donated de-mining materials worth US$16 million to the Cambodian government on February 16. At the ceremony, Sr Denise “rolled up” alongside Deputy Prime Minister Sok An and the Japanese Ambassador to Cambodia.
The action continued at the National Mines Awareness Day event held in mine-affected area Samlout, Battambang on February 24, when Kosal, with the help of the Arrupe dancers, asked everyone to “Lend a Leg”. From high-ranking government officials to young school children, de-miners to NGO workers, everyone rolled up their trouser leg and said, “enough is enough”.
“We want everyone to step forward and Lend their Leg for more rapid mine and cluster bomb clearance, improvement of the lives of survivors and for the Cambodian government to sign the Treaty to ban cluster munitions,” said Sr Denise.
Never missing a campaigning opportunity, Sr Denise and Kosal had the audience at the Tji Haksoon award ceremony “roll up” in solidarity with landmine survivors from around the world.
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For more information on the “Lend your Leg” campaign, www.lendyourleg.org.
