Arsen Avakov: Humanitarian demining after military actions is a key function of our emergency response staff (PHOTO, VIDEO)
The Minister of Internal Affairs stated this on December 1st during the ceremony of delivery twelve off-the-road vehicles to the Ukrainian State Emergency Service (SES) for the purposes of humanitarian demining. These vehicles were provided to SES by the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) with financial support from the Government of Japan. The official ceremony was attended by the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Arsen Avakov, the UNICEF Represerntative in Ukraine Giovanna Barberis and the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Japan to Ukraine Shigeki Sumi.
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The delivery of vehicles took place in the framework of the project «Protected educational environment, safe water, sanitation and hygiene, safety from mines for the children and their families affected by the conflict in the east of Ukraine», which is implemented by the UNICEF Office in Ukraine in cooperation with the Government of Japan.
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«These vehicles are provided as humanitarian aid through UNICEF and there are no «hidden pitfalls» in this procedure, as there are none in the acquisition procedure under the Kyoto Protocol of the cars «Mitsubishi Outlander» for the Ukrainian police», - said Arsen Avakov.
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These specialized off-the-road vehicles, designed on the base of Mitsubishi L200 cars, will be transferred to the ten territorial pyrotechnic units of SES which are responsible for counterexplosive activity in their regions, as well as participate in the humanitarian demining in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions. In addition, such vehicles will be delivered to a special SES rapid response center in the Lvov region and to a SES Training Center in the Kharkov region.
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«In the current situation the shells, brought from the front line, can explode in Kiev, Chernigov, or any other region of Ukraine», - said the Minister of Internal Affairs.
Therefore, he added, the SES pyrotechnic units are still operating in each region, and to perform tasks in the ATO zone the special combined unit was created including experts from all regions of Ukraine.
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«Every week civilians - adults and children - die in the occupied territories, blown up by trip wire mines or unexploded shells. Therefore, the humanitarian projects like this one are so important for us because our citizens have to feel that the country is taking care of them», - said the head of MIA. According to him, this is just the first step in a whole set of measures and the next step will be the development of fully autonomous drones for demining.
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«In a year or two Ukraine will regain territories occupied now by bandits and Russia. Then it will become very important to quickly transform the current «gray» areas into the areas for normal life of our citizens», - said Arsen Avakov.
Department of communication of MIA-Ukraine
