Syria's volunteer sappers improvise mine-clearing methods

BEIRUT (AP) — Volunteers in opposition-held areas of Syria are forced to improvise as they carry out one of the world's most dangerous tasks: dismantling cluster munitions, land mines and explosive booby-traps as they work to make battle-torn areas safe for civilians to return.

Members of the Civil Defense demining teams in Aleppo province have developed their own methods, including burning explosives in primitive pits and detonating unexploded cluster munitions by shooting at them.

The weapons have been used extensively by the Syrian government, the Russian Air Force, and the Islamic State group in civilian areas throughout much of the war, according to evidence gathered by Human Rights Watch and other watchdog agencies.

Clips broadcast from Palmyra on Russian media showed the technicians, clad in specialized protective gear, moving methodically across minefields and booby-trapped neighborhoods, sweeping the ground with metal detectors and explosives-sniffing dogs.

[...] hours-long amateur footage circulating on social media shows YPG volunteers in opposition-held areas prodding the ground with sticks, digging up bomblets with spades, and defusing them by hand.

[...] a series of massive explosions blast dirt several meters (yards) into the air, jarring the cameraman who apparently thought he was standing a safe distance away.

Mayday Rescue, which shepherded the White Helmets into existence in 2013, has trained 25 Civil Defense volunteers in Idlib and Hama provinces on an innovative method to "melt" away explosives in the ground without detonating them, using thermite flares.