Jordan Times
Sunday, December 5, 1999
Queen Noor helps launch Canadian Landmine Foundation
OTTAWA — Her Majesty Queen Noor on Friday joined prominent activists and dignitaries in Ottawa to mark the second anniversary of the Landmines Ban Treaty, the Ottawa Convention.
In her remarks at a dinner at Rideau Hall to launch the Canadian Landmine Foundation, the only private sector charitable organisation devoted exclusively to the eradication of anti-personnel mines, the Queen praised the role Canada has played in bringing about the treaty — the most rapidly ratified arms treaty in history. She said the treaty was unique in that it is the first international arms treaty to encompass humanitarian obligations to the victims. The dinner was hosted by Governor-General Adrienne Clarkson, was attended by Prime Minister Jean Chretien.
“Landmine survivors lose more than an arm or a leg...they often lose their place as respected and valued members of their communities and become dependent on others for survival,” the Queen said.
She added that the needs of survivors “range from immediate medical assistance, to rehabilitation, to help in returning home, to economic assistance and training...With that kind of self-worth, far from remaining victims, they can become the heroes in the battle for conflict recovery.”
She emphasised that landmines posed one of the chief threats to nation recovery “not only because they continue killing and maiming after the conflict has stopped but also because they hold arable land hostage.” On a recent visit to Cambodia, the Queen learned that “four to six million landmines, buried underground, have created a critical shortage of land for settlement and agriculture...(in a society where) 85% of Cambodians are farmers.”
“In Jordan, scarce agricultural lands and some of the most beautiful and sacred historic landscaped in the country, especially in the Jordan River Valley, were scarred and forbidden until recently,” Queen Noor said.
Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy, who hosted a luncheon for Queen Noor, said that the legacy of the Ottawa Treaty is that “it spawned other initiatives of a like kind... and led to a series of campaigns like the campaign to ban small arms and to ban child soldiers.” He added that there is a need for new humanitarian laws along the lines of the United Nations charter that is based on “we the people.”
Jody Williams noted that “civil society was the engine of this movement...In 1992, it was ordinary people like you and me...because we created awareness, we were able to build partnership with governments and it is this partnership that will enable us to meet the challenges facing us.” She emphasised that “it is not enough that 136 countries have signed, every country in the world needs to sign, including the United States, which needs to align its purse and policy and sign the Mine Ban Treaty.”
U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy, who is the Honorary Director of the Canadian Landmine Foundation, praised Queen Noor saying that what she has done “has been a magnificent effort both for the victims of landmines and focusing the world attention on the scourge of landmines.” He said that the United States cannot “stand up and say with all our power that we want other countries to give up their mines, but not us. This is not a question of national security, this is a global moral issue.”
Axworthy accompanied Queen Noor to a special exhibit entitled “Ban Landmines 1999.” The Queen, Nobel-peace price laureate Williams and Senator Leahy chaired a panel for a question and answer period with Canadian students.