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Elephant land-mine victim now a sym



USA TODAY 

November 8, 1999, 

Elephant land-mine victim now a symbol 

Justin Pritchard; Special for USA TODAY 


LAMPANG, Thailand -- An elephant maimed by a land mine might become a
poster pachyderm for
Thailand's campaign against land mines. 

First, Motola must recover from the Aug. 15 explosion that shredded her
front left foot. On Friday,
doctors performed a second surgery on the 3-ton, 38-year-old Thai elephant. 

They say Motola won't be able to walk for at least two months, when they
hope to fit her with an
artificial foot. 

The elephant, Thailand's national animal, holds such a special place in
Thailand's psyche that the public
has donated $ 131,000 for Motola's care. That's in a country with a per
capita income of $ 6,100 in
1998, compared to $ 31,500 in the USA. 

Motola's owner says the elephant stepped on a mine while foraging for food
in Burma, Thailand's
western neighbor, also known as Myanmar. 

Thailand has been spared the killing fields nightmare of its Southeast
Asian neighbors such as Cambodia,
but it isn't free of land mines. 

For years, groups of insurgents trying to topple Burma's military
leadership have been fighting each
other in the region along the Thailand-Burma border. 

Thailand's borders with Cambodia and Malaysia also are littered with land
mines, according to the
United Nations Demining Database. 

In the past two months, land mines reportedly have injured four elephants
along the Burmese border. 

In a reflection of the esteem shown toward elephants, local residents
gathered frequently near the
hospital to wish Motola well and to monitor her progress. 

But the amount of money donated and spent on the care of one animal has
generated some cynicism.
The Nation, one of Thailand's two major English-language newspapers, said
the humane solution is to
put Motola to sleep. 

Others say that the elephant's notoriety can be exploited. The Thai Mine
Action Center has asked
Motola's caretakers if she can be its mascot. 

"Our government right now seems to pay less interest to the mine issue,"
says Col. Talerngpan
Chiewvej, an army engineer who works with the anti-personnel land mine
group. "We would like to let
them know that there is a mine problem in Thailand." 

The founder of the Asian Elephant Foundation, Soraida Salwala, says she
would be "more than willing"
for Motola to help in an anti-personnel land mine campaign. But a request
from another group to use
Motola worries her. 

Thailand's electoral commission wants to use Motola in a campaign to
encourage disabled people to
vote in the country's next general election, expected sometime early next
year. 

Soraida says she doesn't consider it appropriate to equate an injured
elephant with a disabled person. 


GRAPHIC: On road to recovery: Veterinarians take X-rays of Motola's injured
leg in Lampang,
Thailand, before her first surgery in August. 
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