600 men and women work to decontaminate the departments of Valle del Cauca and Nariño.
Soldiers of the Humanitarian Demining Engineers Battalion No.6 restart their operations in the municipalities of Pradera, Palmira and Dagua, in Valle del Cauca, a region in which the previous year they presented 267,000 square meters free of suspected explosive devices.
In turn, with the support of the territorial authorities and the approval of the inhabitants, they hope to continue with manual demining in the municipality of Tuluá and in the municipality of Ipiales, Nariño, where work was suspended in 2020 due to the criminal operation of alleged armed groups outlaw.
In the work done in Tuluá, the military investigated 52 of 77 events according to records, verifying 135,058 square meters, they destroyed seven unexploded ordnance and two explosive devices, it is as well as a time to resume the operations that will focus on seven areas with possible contamination of anti-personnel mines and then conduct the clearance of 35,921 square metres covered in four areas already identified.
It is important to highlight that from 2017 to date, soldiers have presented 27 municipalities free of suspicion of contamination by anti-personnel mines, 10 in Valle del Cauca, 10 Cauca and seven in Nariño, benefiting more than 3,000,000 inhabitants of southwestern Colombia.
For 2021 the mine clearance specialists will work to meet the goal of decontamination in Valle del Cauca, considered in 257 000 square meters.
Source: press-Humanitarian Demining Brigade
