HANOI, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Over 390,000 hectares of land in Vietnam's central Quang Tri province remain contaminated with mines and explosives, said a Quang Tri official on Monday.
Hoang Nam, head of Department of Foreign Affairs in Quang Tri province, some 480 km south of capital Hanoi, was quoted by the state-run radio VOV as saying that more than 83 percent of his province's land is contaminated with mines and explosives.
Since the Vietnam War ended in 1975, Quang Tri has reported over 8,500 cases of casualties caused by mines and explosives, over 30 percent of which are among kids, said Nam.
Over the past 20 years, international non-governmental organizations have conducted bomb clearance for over 116 million hectares of heavily-contaminated land, safely handled 600,000 bombs and explosives in all kinds in Quang Tri, Nam added.
After the 1954 Geneva Conference, Quang Tri was the place where a Demilitarized Zone was created to separate the two factions of North and South Vietnam.
