War Work and the Birth of Mine Action By 1999 the war in Kosovo was raging on our borders. Yugoslav forces were fighting the Kosovo Liberation Army across the border, villages were burning, and streams of families were fleeing into northern Albania with what they could carry. Our own border districts took heavy shelling, cluster… Continue reading A Short History: Humanitarian Mine Action Albania – Chapter 6
Author: Paul Emmerson
A Short History: Humanitarian Mine Action Albania – Chapter 5
A personal story from post-war Albania that shows how humanitarian mine action enables safety, development, and the possibility of home A Door Opens, a Home Begins In those years we lived like students with a family. One bedroom, a little corridor around a bed, a small window, a couch pushed to a corner, our son… Continue reading A Short History: Humanitarian Mine Action Albania – Chapter 5
A Short History: Humanitarian Mine Action Albania – Chapter 4
Learning to Disarm, Learning to Lead In 1998 the Ministry of Defense created a special unit to stop the chain of accidents and to start cleaning the mess of landmines. I moved from Hookas to Tirana and was asked to help set up the division. Under the Partnership for Peace alliance came teams from the… Continue reading A Short History: Humanitarian Mine Action Albania – Chapter 4
A Short History: HMA in Albania – Chapter 3
Accidents in the Field, and the start of a Fledgling Democracy As seen through the eyes of Arben Braha, Albania’s 1st EOD Tech & HMA Program Founder My wife, Rudina, and I met when we were very young. She grew up in a military family and she understood the life, the early calls, the long… Continue reading A Short History: HMA in Albania – Chapter 3
A Short History: HMA in Albania – Chapter 2
Military Academy and the Last Hanging As seen through the eyes of Arben Braha, Albania’s 1st EOD Tech, HMA Program Founder I entered the military academy in 1985. I chose the army because it felt like the only path that was open to me, and because I wanted to serve and to make some kind… Continue reading A Short History: HMA in Albania – Chapter 2
A Short History: Humanitarian Mine Action in Albania
As seen through the eyes of Arben Braha, Albania’s 1st EOD Tech, HMA Program Founder & a good friend to all “The past is never dead. It is not even past.” William Faulkner wrote that, it is the quote that welcomes visitors to the BunkArt2 Museum in Tirana, and it follows me like a shadow.… Continue reading A Short History: Humanitarian Mine Action in Albania
WHITE PHOSPHORUS DISPOSAL IN GUATEMALA
The Golden West Humanitarian Foundation has deep roots in the Americas with projects completed in Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Colombia, Chile, Peru, and Paraguay. Over the past twenty-five years, we supported the Organization of American States, U.S. Department of State, and GICHD throughout the hemisphere with both explosive ordnance disposal (in this case,… Continue reading WHITE PHOSPHORUS DISPOSAL IN GUATEMALA