Heather Bellamy spoke with Mission Without Borders about Ado, who fell victim to an undiscovered mine, and what more they think needs to be done to tackle the problem.

Ado

Heather: What can be done in a situation like that? Is there equipment that people can use to go out to see if the land is safe? What are their options?

Carly: Well, not for an everyday person. They won't possess specialist equipment for detecting landmines. Now that one has been detected in that region though, there will be specialist teams that can go out and start to see if there are others around that area. Then some preventative work can take place. All of that is dependent on the Government being able to take that action though and being able to have the funds available to do that work too.

Heather: What more do you want to see done to remedy this situation, not just for that family, but in the whole area?

Carly: More awareness about the absolute devastation that landmines can cause. That they do have a psychological impact on families, as well as the physical impact of someone actually discovering one.

We'd like to provide more education around the possibility that this could happen and then the response when it does happen. How do we support families? How do we help them overcome that tragedy?

Heather: Who should be doing the work, is that Government work, or is that charities like yourself?

Carly: It's a combination. In any community that wants to have a flourishing civil society and flourishing local government, we should all be working together to tackle this problem. I don't think it's for one section of society to deal with in isolation. It needs a greater approach to be the most beneficial for the people that we help.

Heather: What support have you given to this family?

Carly: They are a wonderful family. We've been supporting them for a number of years. It was very sad because they had just achieved self-sufficiency. We'd helped them to get the goats that Ado had been tending on the land, to have a source of income. So one of the things we've done, because they were so traumatised by what happened, is we've had to change their self-sufficiency project. They did have goats and now they tend cows. We sold the goats because they didn't feel like that was something they could do any more.

That was an initial practical response, but also, we provide ongoing support. We work with the local pastor and the local church to support their spiritual well-being as well. Prayer is such a key thing for the family at the moment in overcoming this.

Heather: How can people find out more about the work you do in Bosnia and Herzegovina?

Carly: People can visit our website, which is mwbuk.org, or they can visit Facebook and give us a like. We regularly update that page with news stories. It has a lot more live information, so we have been featuring that particular family in Bosnia quite a lot. Also people can give us a call if they'd like to know more about our family sponsorship scheme. Our number is 0207 940 1370.