His family business was making anti-personnel mines, but his son’s question changed all that

"So you're a murderer?" his little son asked, and the innocent question changed his life forever.

On a day in 1993, Vito Alfieri Fontana was in the car with his son. On the back seat were some brochures describing the anti-personnel and anti-tank mines produced by the family business, Tecnovar.

His 10-year-old son asked him what the mines were. “I explained it to him,” Vito recalls. “Then you’re a murderer,” was his son’s response. “Then, as if regretting his words, ‘Dad, I understand that everyone can make weapons, but why you?’ From that moment, giving my son an answer has been the real problem of my life. Because it’s a simple question, but it moves a mountain inside you.” (Vanity Fair, January 7).