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IRIN-WA Update 537 of events in West Africa (Thursday
26 August)
LIBERIA: Refugees on the move
Between 2,000 and 3,000 Sierra Leonean refugees have moved from Kolahun to Vahun in the troubled northwest Liberian county of Lofa, according to Action contre la Faim (ACF), one of the few NGOs still operating in Lofa.
Fighting in Lofa this month between government troops and insurgents caused relief agencies and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to pull out from the area. Only ACF and Medical Emergency Relief International (MERLIN) still have programmes running there.
A UNHCR spokesman in Abidjan told IRIN on Thursday his agency was unable to confirm the number of people displaced in Lofa. The spokesman said a UNHCR official was scheduled to leave Abidjan for Monrovia on Friday to assess the safety situation in northwest Liberia.
[See separate item titled 'Refugees on the move']
SIERRA LEONE: Hungry rebels attack food trucks
Hungry rebels in Sierra Leone looted trucks taking essential food to the north and east of the country, AFP reported on Wednesday.
AFP quoted witnesses as saying that the attacks occurred on Monday along the eastern and northern highways, areas previously cut off by prolonged fighting between rebels of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) and pro-government troops.
A food relief truck travelling to Lunsar, 85 km north of Freetown, was attacked and "most of its consignment looted", AFP reported, quoting Abu Sillah of the Professional Drivers Association.
In the other incident, two relief vehicles and a commercial truck were attacked at Masuri Junction, 75 km east of Freetown. One of the trucks, containing 150 bags of rice, was completely looted.
Nigeria to withdraw 2,000 troops from ECOMOG
Nigeria announced on Wednesday it would withdraw 2,000 troops from the West African Peace Monitoring Group (ECOMOG) serving in Liberia by the end of August, news reports said.
Nigerian Information Minister Dapo Sarumi told reporters after a weekly cabinet meeting that more troops would leave in September. Nigeria fields an estimated 12,000 of the 15,000-strong ECOMOG force, Reuters reported.
Nigeria's newly installed democratic president, Olusegun Obasanjo, campaigned partly on a platform to pull troops out of Sierra Leone because of Nigeria's financial difficulties. Nigeria has also announced deep cuts in military manpower, to trim the defence budget.
Nigeria, West Africa's most economically and militarily powerful country, has largely led ECOMOG and provided most of the men, materiel and money for the force ever since it was first deployed, in Liberia, in 1990. Following democratic elections there, ECOMOG was redeployed to Sierra Leone to support its elected government against the RUF.
The RUF, which fought successive governments in Sierra Leone, has now been bought into government under a peace agreement signed in Lome on 7 July.
ECOMOG had no part in brawl
Meanwhile, ECOMOG has criticised two media protection bodies for trying to implicate the force in unbecoming conduct in Sierra Leone.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) in New York, and Reporters Sans Frontier (RSF) in Paris, charged that an ECOMOG officer stood by as three RUF members beat up the editor of `For Di People', a Freetown newspaper, and ransacked the premises.
CPJ and RSF said the rebels had taken offence to an article published in the newspaper on Monday saying the RUF had demanded money from the government for staying in Freetown and then wasted it.
ECOMOG spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Chris Olukolade told IRIN on Thursday: "This was a scuffle between the RUF and the editor. ECOMOG had no part in it."
He said the ECOMOG officer was simply escorting an RUF "leader", under the terms of the Lome agreement, and was not supposed to get involved physically in a "heated debate". This was a police case and such channels of law and order exist in Sierra Leone, he said.
"I have spoken to both parties (the newspaper editor and the RUF men involved) and they said that the ECOMOG officer tried to pacify them," Olukolade said.
He blamed what he saw as a misrepresentation of the incident on some local journalists "bent on disgracing" as many institutions as possible in a desperate attempt to seek asylum abroad.
NIGERIA: Police intercept weapons
Police this week seized weapons and ammunition reportedly bound for the southwest Nigerian state of Ondo, the scene of recent communal clashes, news organisations reported on Thursday.
Some reports had it that three truckloads of arms - including automatic rifles - and ammunition were impounded after being intercepted in Iguobazuwa in Edo state, which lies immediately east of Ondo. However, a media source told IRIN that the arms were being ferried in a single truck. A number of people - 25 according to 'The Guardian' daily - have been arrested.
Additional troops were sent on Wednesday to Ondo under a mid-August peace agreement between leaders of the Ijaw and Ilaje communities that provided for their deployment, the source told IRIN.
At the beginning of August, clashes broke out between the two communities over a land rights dispute which caused the displacement of thousands of people when it first surfaced in September 1998.
The peace agreement has brought some calm to the area and, according to the source, no clashes have been reported over the past week.
GUINEA-BISSAU: Prime Minister files complaint against weekly
Prime Minister Francisco Fadul on Thursday filed a legal complaint against the weekly 'Banobero' newspaper in connection with an article it carried in its edition of 18 August, humanitarian sources in Bissau told IRIN.
The article accused Fadul of misusing state funds during trips abroad, especially during a visit to Italy in March. Fadul has denied the accusation, calling it is baseless. The objective of the government was precisely to fight corruption, he said.
The complaint comes at a time of heightened tension in Guinea-Bissau, one source told IRIN. A former minister was murdered last week while there is now "a tussle between (Military Junta leader Ansumane) Mane and PAIGC politicians," the humanitarian source said.
The source said Mane had reportedly been trying to get the former ruling Partido Africano para a Independencia de Guine-Bissau e Cabo Verde (PAIGC) - to which he also belongs - to replace its leader, Saturnino da Costa, who is expected to be its presidential candidate.
Mane's Military Junta overthrew President Joao Bernardo Vieira in May 1999 after launching a mutiny against him in June 1998. A transitional government is preparing presidential elections scheduled for November.
Meanwhile, Finance Minister Abubakar Dahba left Bissau on Wednesday with a strong delegation from the Military Junta, including Armed Forces Chef of Staff Verisimo Correia, for Russia and Ukraine to discuss Guinea-Bissau's debt and military cooperation, the source said.
Much of the weaponry used by both sides during the war between the Military Junta and Vieira loyalists came from Russia and Ukraine, the source said.
WEST AFRICA: Sahel states vow to modernise agriculture
Directors general of national agricultural research institutions in nine Sahelian countries have pledged to modernise agriculture, as the enter they 21st century, AFP reported on Wednesday.
The pledge was made at a meeting on Wednesday in Nouakchott, Mauritania, of member countries of the Comite inter-etats de lutte contre la secheresse au Sahel (CILSS - the Permanent Inter-State Committee Against Drought in the Sahel).
The Sahel - an arid belt that hugs the southern fringe of the Sahara desert - stretches from the Atlantic Ocean archipelago of Cape Verde in the West to Chad, some 4,000 km due east.
The meeting adopted a triennial programme for 1999-2001 proposed by the Sahel Institute in Bamako, Mali, which coordinates the activities of national bodies fighting drought and desertification. The programme institutionalises meetings of directors general of research bodies and the continued evaluation of agronomical research results in the Sahel
CILSS, which is also tasked with fighting the consequences of desertification, comprises Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Chad, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Mauritania, Niger and Senegal.
UN SECURITY COUNCIL: Abuse of children in war condemned
The UN Security Council on Wednesday strongly condemned
the targeting of children in situations of armed conflict.
The unanimous resolution was directed against abuses such as killing, maiming, sexual violence, abduction, forced displacement, and the recruitment and use of children in armed conflict in violation of international law.
It also condemned attacks on places that usually have a significant presence of children such as schools and hospitals, and called on all parties concerned to put an end to such practices.
The Council also expressed support for the ongoing work of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, Olara Otunnu, UN agencies and other organisations that deal with children affected by armed conflict.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan was asked to submit
a report on the implementation of the resolution to
the Council by 31 July 2000.
Otunnu told the Council that over the last decade, two
million children had been killed in wars, one million
orphaned, six million seriously injured and over 10
million left with grave psychological trauma. Children
in some 50 countries are suffering from the effects
of war and its aftermath, he added.
Otunnu said words on paper could not save children and women in peril so energies must be shifted from the juridical project of elaborating norms to the political project of ensuring their application and respect on the ground.
According to Otunnu, a three-pronged approach is needed to stem the massive use of children as soldiers. Firstly, the minimum age for recruitment into armies should be raised from the present 15 to 18 years, he said.
Secondly, pressure must be put internationally on armed groups that abuse children, he said. Finally, the political, social and economic factors that create environments in which children are induced to become child soldiers must be addressed.
Abidjan, 26 August 1999; 18:08 GMT
[ENDS]
[IRIN-WA: Tel: +225 217366 Fax: +225 216335 e-mail: irin-wa@ocha.unon.org ]
Item: irin-english-1493
[This item is delivered in the "irin-english" service of the UN's IRIN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations. For further information or free subscriptions, or to change your keywords, contact e-mail: irin@ocha.unon.org or fax: +254 2 622129 or Web: http://www.reliefweb.int/IRIN . If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this item, please retain this credit and disclaimer.]
Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 1999
Editor: Ali B. Ali-Dinar
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