Deadly landmine threat stalks Angola

Rising numbers of children are falling victim to mines

By David Shukman in Kuito

The United Nations is warning that people in Angola are at greater risk than ever as the two sides in the civil war deploy new landmines.

It estimates that up to seven million landmines have been laid already during Angola's two decades of civil war.

We feel that maybe we don't want to live any more

Landmine victim Joanna Maria Raimundo

Diana, Princess of Wales, visited Angola during a ceasefire three years ago to campaign for an end to the use of landmines, a move soon followed by an international ban on anti-personnel mines.

One of the towns she visited was Kuito, and nowhere have people suffered so much from landmines.

With the fighting continuing the clearing of mines has to stop.

Aid workers fear that mines will devastate not only this generation but the next as well.

Princess Diana focused attention on landmine use

Children are falling victim to mines in ever greater numbers.

What is worse is that new mines are now being laid - and new mines can only mean more casualties in the future.

One landmine victim, Joanna Maria Raimundo, said: "I think so often about being disabled and of course the war keeps going on and so we feel that maybe we don't want to live any more."

Airlifts are the only source of food for over a million people.

Fighting surrounds them but they cannot escape because the roads are closed by landmines.

The weapons come from many different countries as the war attracts arms dealers, and both sides in the conflict use them

Angola was once a source of hope in the struggle against landmines. No longer.