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Weapons Abatement, Demining Experts to Speak at UC

State Department Official, NGO Leader Address Human Rights Class, Public

Written By Keith Henry

Contact - cleogrande@utica.edu

Utica, NY (04/21/2009) - The UN estimates that each year between 15,000 and 20,000 people are injured or killed by land mines and other unexploded ordinance. Many of the casualties are children. The deadly residues of war lie in wait in farmers’ fields, on roadsides and in remote villages. The UN, the U.S. State Department and a host of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are engaged in the dangerous work of ridding the world of these lethal vestiges of war.

Charles Stonecipher, a program manager for the State Department’s Weapons Removal/Abatement program in Cambodia and Laos, and Kurt Chesko, vice president of the HALO Trust, a non-profit committed to clearing the world’s former battlegrounds of dangerous unexploded ordinance, will speak to Professor Ted Orlin’s Human Rights class on Thursday, April 23 at 6 p.m. at Utica College. The talk, which will take place in Hubbard Hall, room 206, is free and open to the public but space is limited. Both guests are experts at the demining and weapons abatement initiatives around the world and will speak of their experiences and the work left to do across the globe.

The pair of experts is visiting the area at the invitation of the Rotary Club of Utica and will be honored at a fundraising dinner on Friday, April 25 at the Yahnundasis Country Club in New Hartford. According to the Rotary Website, “Kurt Chesko of HALO Trust (USA) will return to give us an update on HALO's demining work throughout the world, and in our project in Cambodia. Also, Charles A. Stonecipher, Program Manager for Cambodia, U.S. Department of State Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement, will provide details on the support that the US government is providing worldwide to identify and remove unexploded weapons.”

Professor Orlin thinks it’s important that his human rights students understand the ongoing threat posed by land mines. “The question of land mines remains a critical one for innocent people around the world. To have my students exposed to these two experts who remove land mines and other unexploded ordinance sheds light on a high priority area of the human rights struggle.”

For more information about the talk, call (315) 792-3055.


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