Anti Personnel Mines example essay topic

Saving the World One Tax dollar at a Time By: Heather Stein Canada, a sparsely populated giant, is not a land of patriotic zealots. Compared to the economic powerhouse down south, our dollar is always low, and our dependency on the world's last remaining superpower often leaves us with the belief that the "true north strong and free" is but a pilot fish living off a shark. Canadian citizens, however, have an extraordinary reason to be proud. The Chretien administration has allotted one hundred million dollars to the global eradication of landmines, a noble goal. Our elected officials trumpet the Ottawa Convention On The Prohibition Of The Use, Stockpiling, Production, And Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines And On Their Destruction, and can now boast of 136 signing nations, six of which are members of the G 8: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the United Kingdom. This treaty is viewed by many as establishing a new standard.

A precedent for the prohibition of weapons of war has been set with the ban upon chemical gases, but a revolutionary process has begun: The multi-national negotiation and acceptance of an arms control agreement by same-minded states and organizations outside the confines of the United Nations. Canada is in the midst of ridding the world of a scourge. According to Clear Landmines, a non-profit organization devoted to the removal of these weapons of destruction, anti-personnel mines kill or mutilate 26,000 people a year, 8000 of which are children under the age of fifteen. Though there are over 344 models of these devices, the Soviet PFM-1 or "butterfly mine", as it is called because of its shape, is one of the most heinous.

Widely used in Afghanistan, the surreptitious contrivance is scattered by airplane into fields, where youngsters pick them up, believing them to be toys. The innocents not only lose limbs but also develop eye impairments due to the toxicity of the explosive. The gas released is so hazardous that when the Ukraine attempted to destroy their stockpiles the fumes killed eight employees. Should children have their lives ruined by a war leftover found in their own backyards? Although almost all of the non-signatories of this noble treaty agree with the notion of a ban, some fifty countries have yet to sign-including three of the five permanent members of the United Nations: Russia, China, and the United States. Sixteen governments are still producers, eight in Asia, three in Europe, two in the Americas, and three in the Middle East.

However, the U.S. has announced that it will ratify the agreement in 2006 is it is successful in developing alternative weaponry. Are our xenophobic neighbours afraid to join the rest of the first world countries in condemning peacetime civilian atrocities, or do they just have no morals? Canada should be applauded for having sidestepped excuses and bureaucracy for the benefit of humanity. Although our economy may be slower, weather a tad chilly, and country oftentimes on the verge of separation, every Canadian citizen has a reason to be proud.

No matter what lives we lead or how much we spoil our children, our tax dollars are busy at work making us good people for helping to ban landmines. It's a question of morals, and apparently, Canadians have many..