The Baltic and Polish interior ministers are calling on EU institutions to coordinate support for demining operations in Ukraine and to provide funding.
Initiated by the interior ministers of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Poland and sent by Lithuanian Interior Minister Agnė Bilotaitė, a joint letter calls on the European Commission to coordinate the provision of support for mine clearance in Ukraine and to assess the possibility of EU funding for it, the Lithuanian Interior Ministry said on Friday.
Read more: Lithuania looking to send deminers to Ukraine, defence chief cautions against it
One of the proposed options is to use the ATLAS network of representatives of police tactical units from all 27 EU member states.
The letter is addressed to the European Commission and France, which is now holding the rotating EU presidency, as well as to the incoming Czech presidency. It calls for “early involvement in the process of saving lives in Ukraine” and for the coordination of efforts to mobilise mine clearance experts to work in the war-torn country.
The Ukrainian authorities estimate that around 50 percent of the country’s territory (approximately 300,000 square kilometers) has been affected by military action, putting peaceful civilians returning to liberated areas at high risk from mines, explosives and unexploded ammunition left behind.
Explosives can be found everywhere, including fields, streets and private homes, and Russian soldiers have also hidden explosives in furniture and even in children’s toys.
On Thursday, Lithuanian Interior Minister Bilotaitė said that the country was looking into possibilities of sending Lithuanian deminers to Ukraine and that one specialist was already there as part of a team investigating alleged war crimes.
Meanwhile, Lithuania’s chief of defence, Lieutenant General Valdemaras Rupšys, has cautioned that sending military personnel to Ukraine could be construed as direct involvement in the war.
“NATO leaders [and] our leaders have said that we are not directly involved,” Rupšys said on Thursday. “NATO will certainly not be there with its personnel and will not fight, so going there and carrying out demining operations can be treated as direct involvement in that war.”
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