From February 12 to 15, 2024, the Group of Inter-American Humanitarian Demining Monitors in Colombia (GMI-CO), a mission of the Inter-American Defense Board in support of the Comprehensive Action Program against Antipersonnel Mines of the Organization of American States (AICMA-OAS), carried out field evaluations for accreditation of personnel of the humanitarian demining organization Humanity & Inclusion (HI).
Founded in 1982, HI is an international humanitarian organization that since 2016 has been involved in humanitarian demining and mine risk education operations in Colombia. The operational evaluations took place at the organization's base in Puerto Concordia – Meta, in order to allow 17 Colombian women and men to act in the work of liberating land suspected of contamination by antipersonnel mines, in the manual or demining technique. in carrying out non-technical studies, prior activity of collecting and analyzing information to classify possible areas to intervene as dangerous or not.
The evaluations carried out by the GMI-CO used officers from the Brazilian Navy, the Brazilian Army and a specialist from AICMA-OAS. Brazilian Army Captain Luã Mascarenhas de Carvalho, who carried out his first operational evaluation as a member of the GMI-CO, points out: “This was an excellent opportunity to verify and apply in the field all the knowledge that I have acquired, either in the courses of training that I took in Brazil or here in Colombia.”
Since 2006, the GMI-CO has supported the efforts of the OAS and Colombian authorities to reduce the effects of antipersonnel mines and improvised explosive devices, which have penalized the population of this country for six decades. Currently, the Group is made up of officers from the Brazilian Navy, Brazilian Army and Mexican Army.
