In April 2012, I went on my trip to the field – visiting MAG’s programs in Iraq and Lebanon. MAG Iraq is our biggest program: we clear land for agriculture and development needs, deploy emergency response Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) teams to destroy dangerous items, provide Mine Risk Education (MRE) to reduce the threat to the community, and the Community Liaison (CL) teams work with communities and partners to make sure our work is addressing the most urgent needs.

On our first day in the field, I traveled with MAG’s Community Liaison Manager (CLM) and other program staff to a refugee camp.  While driving on the dusty roads of Dohuk, we saw droves of students walking to school. I asked MAG’s CLM if the children in the refugee camps were able to attend school, and he told me the kids will join the schools when the semester begins again.

The families in the camp fled to Dohuk to escape the instability and violence in Syria. The camp was a dizzying sea of tents, with a construction crew leveling land in the distance so more tents could be pitched. Most families brought along small children, biding their time by playing tag and creating games. Having a family of my own, it made me wonder how hard it must be to live in such a place.  Fortunately, the families were being provided with food, water, and the adults had been given the right to work in the Kurdish region. 

MAG Iraq supports the Kurdish Regional Government by making sure the land used for the refugee camps is free of landmines and unexploded ordnance.  The CL teams have also been providing men, women, and children with Risk Reduction Education so that they can recognize the signs of landmine and explosive weapons contamination and avoid dangerous areas.  MAG’s CL teams also hang posters around the camp so refugees can learn what to do if they come into contact with a landmine or piece of unexploded ordnance.

This blog was written by Brandon Sternquist, the Grants Manager and primary liaison with the U.S. Department of State's Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement, which is MAG's largest donor.