International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBLM) is an organization dedicated to stopping the use of antipersonnel land mines (APL’s) by the military forces of all nations. APL’s are explosive devices concealed on the ground as fatal traps for those who touch or step on them. Military forces lay APL’s to kill or injure enemy troops. However, the APL’s remain in place long after the fighting is over and sometimes kill and maim innocent victims, such as children at play or women collecting firewood. Thousands of people are killed or maimed by land mines each year. The ICBLM and its co-ordinator Jody Williams shared the 1997 Nobel Prize for peace for their work in urging governments to clear land mines and stop using them.
The campaign against land mines began in 1991 mainly through the efforts of the Vietnam Veterans of America, based in Washington, D.C., and the German organization Medico International. These two organizations appointed Jody Williams, an American social activist, to coordinate the campaign. In 1992, Williams founded the International Campaign to Ban Landmines. The campaign, originally backed by six nongovernmental organizations (NGO’s), grew to represent more than 1,300 NGO’s in over 85 countries.
Williams and her fellow campaigners succeeded in focusing the attention of ordinary people on the issue of land mines and in mobilizing public opinion against them. The ICBLM succeeded in bringing about an international agreement to ban land mines, drawn up in Oslo, Norway, in 1997. More than 160 countries have signed the treaty, which went into effect in March 1999.
See also Mine warfare ; Williams, Jody .
