Ministry of Defence: More than 5,000 km² cleared of mines in Ukraine

More than 5,000 km² of Ukrainian soil has been cleared of mines since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion.

This was announced by First Deputy Minister of Defense of Ukraine Lieutenant General Ivan Havryliuk.

The progress of demining was discussed at a meeting of the National Mine Action Authority.

According to Havryliuk, since 2022, state mine action operators have surveyed and cleared 5308 km² of Ukrainian territory.

The meeting was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministries of Economy, Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories, the State Labour Service, the State Emergency Service, and other agencies and enterprises involved in mine action.

They discussed measures to implement the plans for humanitarian demining of the de-occupied territories of Ukraine for 2024 and for the survey of agricultural land from explosive hazards.

It is noted that since the beginning of the year, non-technical surveys had been carried out in 59 territorial communities and 235 km² had been identified as possibly contaminated.

Currently, humanitarian demining is being carried out on 282 sites with a total area of 17.5 km², of which 88 sites with a total area of 7.23 km² have already been transferred to territorial communities.

In addition, 2059 km² of agricultural land has been surveyed and cleared of explosive hazards in accordance with the plan to clear it of explosive ordnance. This area was returned to productive use.

“According to the results of the initial non-technical survey of areas affected by explosive ordnance, their area has decreased from 156,000 km² to 142,000 km²,” said Ivan Havryliuk.

During the discussion, attention was also paid to the demining of the Ukrainian sea. It is planned that next year Ukraine would receive three more demining ships. In addition to two existing ones.

In addition, the Ministry of Defense reported that the effectiveness of maritime demining had increased thanks to the support of Germany, which had provided special equipment for detecting and classifying explosive devices.