The State Emergency Service creates 80 new pyrotechnic units to carry out humanitarian demining of the territory of Ukraine
This was announced by the spokeswoman of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Alyona Matveeva during a briefing in Ukrinform today, June 28.
“We need both technical staffing of these units and training. Each such unit should include two units of equipment, engineering equipment for demining and protective clothing for workers,” said Alyona Matveeva.
According to the spokeswoman, trainings and training courses have been organized on the basis of the Interregional Center for Humanitarian Demining and Rapid Response to train new pyrotechnicians and improve the qualifications of those already working.
“The training was attended by a group of Estonian personnel for the defusing of improvised explosive devices of the Estonian Rescue Service Centre and the Defence Centre, the Danish Refugee Council and the Danish Mine Action Group, as well as the OSCE International Technical Assistance Project “Development of Ukraine's Mine Countermeasure Potential”, — Poin was formed by the spokesperson of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
She also noted that at the moment there are enough specialists for primary mining. But the shortage of personnel can become noticeable when you have to deport all the deoccupied territories.
“Now pyrotechnics cope with the volume. However, there will be more and more territories. The sooner we pick them up, the more pyrotechnics will be needed. Perhaps, on the contrary, the pyrotechnics will manage to mine these territories and we will move on to others. Now we are talking about the primary demining, which we plan to do within a year after the de-occupation of all territories. And the general demining, including forest fields, takes longer — from 5 to 10 years,” the spokeswoman stressed.
At the same time, she noted that today many international partners express a desire to participate in the humanitarian demining of Ukraine. In particular, within the framework of international cooperation, the Interregional Center for Humanitarian De-mining of the State Emergency Service has signed memoranda on cooperation in the field of mining activities with the Geneva Center for Humanitarian Demining, as well as with the Croatian Mine Action Center — the Center for Testing, Development and Training.
“Today, many international partners express a desire to send pyrotechnic teams to Ukraine to carry out humanitarian demining. And they also help in the technical equipping of the pyrotechnic units of the Ministry of Internal Affairs,” Matveeva said.
Photo by Oleg Suprun
