Empowering local people to demine their communities
Myanmar has suffered the most landmine casualties in the world two years in a row. According to the Mines Advisory Group 2025 report, over 2,000 people were killed or injured by landmines in 2024 – double the figure reported the previous year. The real number of casualties is almost certainly higher.
Across the country, landmines are having a devastating effect, not only causing death and injury, but also destroying livelihoods.
- Myanmar is the world’s deadliest country for landmine and unexploded ordinance casualties.
- 20% of landmine victims are children.
- Landmines not only kill and maim, they also contribute to poverty by preventing people returning to farms and homes in areas where conflict has ended or decreased.
- Major international organisations are not running demining operations in Myanmar.
- Demining is often currently carried out by untrained soldiers from ethnic resistance armies, using tools as simple as a combat knife, or by civilians using farming tools or even rocks.
With no international demining organisations doing any demining in the country, Advance Myanmar’s landmine clearance pilot project is unique. There are now areas freed from military control that are run by local administrations, where demining is possible. People are desperate to return to their land, to their homes and farms, but communities have very limited resources to deal with this issue, often clearing landmines with only sticks and pocketknives as their equipment. We want to help local communities to gain the skills they need to address this issue for themselves, without having to wait for international organisations to implement large-scale demining. Demining can’t wait.
The project
Our landmine clearance project is being led on the ground by Free Burma Rangers, an organisation with decades of experience working in Myanmar, and implemented in conjunction with the Karenni Interim Executive Council (IEC). The IEC is the government set up by resistance forces in the parts of Karenni State freed from Burmese military occupation, and the project is guided by their expertise and local needs.
Thanks to the project, advanced machinery has been built or bought and brought into the area, machinery used for clearing the ground and doing the first round of digging, before people equipped with proper safety equipment and with mine detectors clear the site. Already, the project is showing amazing results:
- Hundreds of explosive hazards have been removed, and no deminer injured.
- The village now has 196 residents, with more and more joining after seeing that it is safe.
- The village school has reopened, with 57 children enrolled.
“We are deeply grateful to everyone who has supported our village, especially those who helped make the demining work possible. Because of your support, families are returning, children are back in school, and our community is beginning to live again.”
Village head of the landmine clearance project village
The ultimate aim is to develop a project model that can be scaled up and duplicated across Myanmar in areas that have been freed from military control, and to show that community-led demining in Myanmar is possible.