Dennis Minga holds a dummy land mine.

---

Isle anti-mine group
gets $4 million

The mysterious gift may
have come from a foundation
established by Princess Diana

By Susan Kreifels
Star-Bulletin

It's a story about a dream, a princess, a mysterious gift, a wish granted.

Hawaii residents Dennis Minga and G. Kalani Long shared a passion to rid the world of land mines and make villages of millions of children safe once again. They had little money but lots of enthusiasm and ideas.

Diana, princess of Wales, wanted the same thing. The three planned to meet here early next year, but then the princess died in a car crash Aug. 31. Diana's death, however, stirred compassion around the world for the children they wanted to help.

And then came a mysterious gift: $4 million with the promise of much more. The dream came true.

The money is to be delivered around Christmas Day. "When it was first offered to me, I didn't believe it. I thought it was too good to be true," said Minga, co-founder of the Royal Hawaiian Institute for Land Mine Removal & Reform.

Asked if the money came from Princess Diana's foundation, Minga said he could not identify the source of the money as a condition of the donor. "That is what many people have concluded, but I can't verify that," he said.

Minga said, however, that the organization was European and had been besieged with donations from the public on behalf of its founder, a well-known personality.

Minga, the city deputy director of auditoriums who will resign his post Dec. 31, said the organization had solicited a proposal from the Royal Hawaiian Institute that was delivered in September.

The story began early this year when Minga and Long, who have seen firsthand the tragedy of land mines, started the Royal Hawaiian Institute. The main target of the nonprofit group was Cambodia.

Princess Diana heard about the Royal Hawaiian Institute through help it had given British demining groups there. Her foundation asked Minga and Long to escort the princess to Cambodia early next year, and she planned to meet them in Hawaii en route.

An outpouring of grief from around the world followed her death, and instant attention was drawn to her charitable causes, including land-mine removal.

"Because of Princess Diana's death, the world is starting to become focused on land mines," Minga said. "As time went on, we began to realize this was for real."

Dr. Sasha Stiles, a family practice physician with Kaiser Permanente, is volunteer administrator and overseer of the $4 million donation. Stiles also said she could not identify the donor.

She said, however, that the funding should continue at increased levels for many years.

Stiles, who has done medical missionary work and other projects in Cambodia for the last decade, met Long and Minga this year.

"There are times in life when you stand around and things come to you," Stiles said. "This is one of the times when things just sort of fell into place. It was a match made in heaven.

"I happened to be someone the donor has trusted over the years. I have a heartfelt need to help these people (Cambodians)."

Stiles said the donor focuses on helping children.

"Sometimes the kids can't play because they are strapped to trees. Their parents are afraid of land mines," Stiles said.

Village-by-village demining in Cambodia is the main thrust of the Royal Hawaiian Institute. The initial project was humble: The first class of 14 Cambodians was trained in September to do "the dance of death with the devils." They donned their new black-and-yellow uniforms bearing the Royal Hawaiian Institute logo to start demining Am Leong village.

Those projects will increase. Minga said the institute has also been contacted to demine along Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh Trail.

The institute plans to open a school on Kauai, because land is cheaper and a man offered to donate 100 acres, to teach demining to people from around the world. It will also develop a land-mine museum there.

And Minga said the institute will use a telecommunications center at Maui's supercomputer facility for long-distance learning and seminars.

The United Nations estimates that more than 100 million active antipersonnel mines are planted in at least 60 countries.

The mines kill and maim 26,000 people a year, up to 80 percent of them civilians.

Minga said the Royal Hawaiian Institute's goal has been the same as Princess Diana's: "to bring the debate from the back pages of the news to the front pages, where she always said it belonged."