Humanitarian Disarmament in Serbia
The Republic of Serbia’s mine and explosive remnants of war ( ERW ) problem is a result of the conflicts connected to the break-up of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. Serbia has a relatively small mine problem confined to its southern border with Kosovo. However, it has a much larger problem of cluster munition remnants ( CMR ) and unexploded ordnance ( UXO ). The exact number of mine/ERW casualties in Serbia is not known.
MBT : state party; clearance deadline: 1 March 2019.
CCM : not a state party.
Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA) started its operations in Serbia in 2006 conducting non-technical survey (NTS) of areas suspected to be contaminated with unexploded cluster sub-munitions in Serbia.
Until the end of 2015 NPA provided support to the Mine Action Centre of the Republic of Serbia (SMAC) with a non-technical survey team. During the first months of 2016, NPA conducted refugee relief work in South Serbia in order to respond to the refugee crisis through marking of dangerous areas, mine risk education and by providing transport, medical aid and support to the refugees.
From 2011-2013, NPA was the most efficient operator in the country--beating out private commercial organizations both in terms of a lower cost per square meter released as well as a higher concentration of dangerous items removed per square meter cleared.
In the period from 2006 to 2008, NPA cleared around 1 km2 of minefields on the Serbian border between Serbia and Croatia, locating and destroying 349 landmines. The project was implemented by the NPA Mine Action Programme in Croatia with support from the NPA’s regional office in Belgrade.