Colombia’s Defense Minister has decorated two soldiers who climbed the
Western Hemisphere’s highest peak despite losing legs to land mines.
The Government honored the men along with
other soldiers mutilated by mines. Colombia also announced it would
host a major review conference on the 1997 international treaty on land
mines in early December.
The Defense Ministry says land mines have killed at least 1,690 people in Colombia since 1990.
Leftist rebels are blamed for most of the
mines, including those that blew off the legs of the two soldiers who
later climbed Argentina’s 22,841-foot (6,962-meter) Mount Aconcagua.
Colombia
is among 156 parties to the 1997 Ottawa Convention on anti-personnel
mines. The U.S., Russia and China are among those that have not signed
it. (AP)