Policy

The Republic of Tunisia signed the Mine Ban Treaty on 4 December 1997 and ratified on 9 July 1999, becoming a State Party on 1 January 2000.

Tunisia has listed 10 laws that it considers implementation measures for the Mine Ban Treaty.[1]

Tunisia submitted its fifteenth Article 7 transparency report in April 2015, covering the period from April 2014 to April 2015.[2]

Tunisia did not participate in the Third Review Conference in Maputo, Mozambique in June 2014 or the intersessional meetings in June 2015.

Production, transfer, stockpile destruction, and retention

Tunisia has never produced or exported antipersonnel mines, but imported them in the past.[3] Tunisia completed the destruction of 18,259 stockpiled antipersonnel mines in September 2003.[4]

In its initial declaration in July 2000, Tunisia reported retaining 5,000 antipersonnel mines (4,000 PMA-3 and 1,000 PROM-1) for purposes permitted under Article 3 of the Mine Ban Treaty.[5] In its Article 7 report submitted in 2015, Tunisia reported that it retains 4,670 mines for training and that 100 mines were used for training purposes during the April 2014 to April 2015 reporting period.[6] Tunisia has not specified the type of retained mines that it has destroyed, nor has it reported in detail on the intended purposes and actual uses of retained mines, as agreed by States Parties in 2004.

Use

Since April 2013, new use of improvised explosive devices by non-state armed groups has been reported during the Tunisian Armed Forces’ ongoing operations against Islamist rebel forces in the region of Jebel Al-Cha’anby in Qsrein Wilaya/Kasserine governorate near the Algerian border.[7]

In December 2014, one government soldier was killed and one injured by a landmine explosion on Mount Samama in Kasserine governorate.[8] In August 2015, two soldiers were killed by landmines during an army operation on Mount Mghila in the Kasserine region.[9] Other casualties were caused by antivehicle mines (see also the Casualty profile).[10]

In May 2013, the Ministry of Defense stated that the mines laid at Jebel Al-Cha’anby were homemade mines constructed from plastic with a chemical initiator, making detection difficult.[11] A spokesperson said, “the mines that exploded were made of ammonium nitrate fertilizer and flammable materials that can easily explode when exposed to heat.”[12]

In May 2013, a police officer told Human Rights Watch (HRW) that the late April casualties were caused by “artisanal” (or homemade) antipersonnel mines that exploded horizontally, and from this description, the mines would appear to be homemade tripwire-initiated explosive devices similar to Claymore mines.[13]