(For related story see AFGHAN DEMINING/ or [ID:nCOL265043])

Sept. 17 (Reuters) - Afghanistan is one of the heaviest mined countries in the world and has the world's third highest annual death and injury rate from unexploded ordnance after Colombia and Cambodia.

Here are some facts about landmines in Afghanistan:

DEATHS AND INJURIES:

-- Around 62 people are killed or injured each month by landmines and unexploded ordnance in Afghanistan, the United Nations Mine Action Program estimates.

TWO DECADES OF MINE-LAYING:

-- Most landmines were laid during the decade-long war of resistance following the Soviet occupation in 1979.

-- They were also used by various armed groups during the 1992-1996 civil war, particularly in Kabul and its outskirts, and during the rule of the Taliban regime (1996-2001).

-- The US-led coalition's late 2001 intervention also added considerable quantities of unexploded ordnances (UXO), including cluster munitions. This was followed by further landmine use by non-coalition forces, the Landmine Monitor group says.

TENS OF THOUSANDS REMAIN:

-- There are still around 100,000, the UN estimates.

-- In May 2006, Afghanistan reported that it had destroyed 65,973 stockpiled mines since signing the Mine Ban Treaty in 2002, including 44,819 since the beginning of 2005.

DEMINING PROGRAMS:

-- Afghanistan has the world's longest-established, largest, and first indigenous mine action program.

-- Some 8,500 Afghans work for organisations co-ordinated by the Mine Action Program Afghanistan (MAPA), begun under the auspices of the United Nations in 1989.

-- Afghanistan also receives the lions' share of mine action funding globally. In 2005, 16 countries and the European Commission donated Afghanistan $66.8 million for mine action; as compared to donations for Sudan ($48.4 million), Angola ($35.8 million), Iraq ($27.8 million) and Cambodia ($23.9 million).

Sources: Landmine Monitor Report on Afghanistan, 2006 (www.icbl.org/lm)

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