COVID-19

COVID-19 has highlighted the fact that we are all a global community and do not act in isolation.  This health crisis has forced many of us to face and understand what it means to be in a desperate situation with our personal health and that of our loved ones in constant peril as we fight the war with this deadly virus.

As we face this global threat at the community and household level living in forced social isolation, consider channeling your newfound compassion to communities who live with war as a part of their daily lives—those who are constantly thinking about if they will have enough food to survive, how they will support their families, what happens when war comes knocking at their doorstep. 

The hidden killers of landmines keep communities living in fear.  Together, we must confront the phantom enemy of coronavirus as it is a virtual landmine.

As we heal the soil, we heal the soul.   May we learn from this COVID-19 global challenge, and evolve as a more compassionate society.

UN Landmine Awareness Day

UN Landmine Awareness Day—April 4, 2020

On January 31st, the Trump Administration—in a Friday afternoon news drop—announced that it was expanding the use of landmines in battle. 

While the story did garner fleeting national attention, it was predictably churned in the news cycle and has all but disappeared from the headlines.

Having spent over 20 years leading demining awareness operations in the  most landmine-affected countries in the world as founder of Roots of Peace, I urge leaders to consider the real ramifications of this decision. 

Renewed deployment of landmines will dramatically undermine US peacekeeping efforts by placing the burden of fear and violence on civilian populations.

Opposing military forces benefit from access to detection technologies that civilian populations lack.  There are an estimated 60 million landmines silently poised in 60 countries that maim/kill innocent farmers and children long after the guns have silenced.  Today, over 70 percent of landmine victims are civilians.  And, over half of those are children.

I have seen the way that landmines paralyze civilian efforts in times of war and times of peace alike.  Children deserve to kick a soccer ball and chase a butterfly without fear of losing a limb.  Roots of Peace’s vision of transforming MINES TO VINES—replacing the scourge of landmines with bountiful vineyards and orchards worldwide—is based upon the belief that landmines are not simply tools of war.  They are perpetrators of war.  They make sustained peace impossible, long after the conflicts that put them in the ground have ended.  Landmines carry no flag, and know no color, and we will continue our humanitarian efforts to plant the roots of peace for future generations to thrive.