The Interagency Working Group on Humanitarian Demining chaired by First Deputy Prime Minister – Minister of Economy of Ukraine Yuliia Svyrydenko has started its work.

The task of the group established by a government decision on 14 February 2023 is to facilitate coordination of executive authorities’ activities in the relevant field and to develop proposals for the formulation and implementation of state policy on humanitarian demining.

Referring to foreign experience, namely that of the Balkans, Yuliia Svyrydenko noted that humanitarian demining was a long and laborious process. Depending on the areas that require demining, it can take years and decades. Many countries that have recently been involved in hostilities have gone through this process. Unfortunately, this is what Ukraine will have to go through. However, as the First Deputy Prime Minister emphasized, everything possible should be done to ensure that both the country’s recovery and humanitarian demining, which is part of the recovery, took place as soon as possible. 

The group must come up with solutions that would maximize the efficient use of available domestic resources as well as potential external resources that Ukraine can raise internationally. Priorities need to be set to ensure that these resources, namely human, material, financial, etc. are used reasonably today and in the future.

“We have to solve many tasks to clear our territories of the consequences of the war as quickly as possible and in strict compliance with current Ukrainian and international standards in this area,” said Yuliia Svyrydenko.

The IWG on demining includes representatives of the Ministry of Economy, the Ministry for Communities, Territories and Infrastructure Development, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food, the Ministry of Defence, the State Emergency Service, the State Service for Restoration and Infrastructure Development, the State Service for Geodesy, Cartography and Cadastre and a representative of the Secretariat of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine.

During the first meeting of the Interagency Working Group on Humanitarian Demining, the following issues were raised:

• resources available for demining, additional resource needs and a list of donor organizations;
• the number and territorial location of sites requiring demining activities;
• the procedure for prioritizing demining sites and the order of conduct of measures;
• approaches, criteria and sufficiency of information to fill in the map of sites to be demined;
• coordination of actions of entities involved in organization and execution of demining activities.

The meeting also discussed the current regulatory framework for humanitarian demining and the possibility of its update. Following the meeting, the Interagency Working Group recommended that the relevant central executive authorities prepared proposals on the issues raised.