U N I T E D   N A T I O N S
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Integrated Regional Information Network for West Africa

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WEST AFRICA
IRIN-WA Weekly Roundup 169
29 March - 04 Arpril 2003


CONTENTS:

COTE D'IVOIRE: Moves towards resolution of crisis
LIBERIA: Situation continues to be volatile
SIERRA LEONE: UNHCR opens new refugee camp in Kenema
WEST AFRICA: Church leaders urge US and UN to support MRU
NIGERIA: Concerns about rights violations as elections approach
TOGO: New report on child-trafficking
NIGER: Choosing between arms and development


COTE D'IVOIRE: Moves towards resolution of crisis
 
Representatives of Cote d'Ivoire's three rebel groups, the Mouvement
Patriotique de Cote d'Ivoire (MPCI), the Mouvement pour la Justice et la
paix (MJP) and the Mouvement Populaire du Grand-Ouest (MPIGO), finally
turned up for a cabinet meeting of the new national unity government on
Thursday. For three weeks, the rebels had refused to join the new
government headed by Prime Minister Seydou Diarra, saying they were denied
key portfolios. Ghana's President and chairman of the Economic Community
of West African States (ECOWAS) John Kufuor, Togolese President Gnassingbe
Eyadema and Nigeria's President Olusegun Obasanjo attended the Thursday
meeting in the capital Yamoussoukro, 260 km north of Abidjan.

At the Security Council this week, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan
presented his report on the war-torn West African country. The report
followed a UN multidisciplinary assessment mission from 24 February to 7
March and makes proposals for military and civilian interventions to
resolve the Ivoirian crisis. The 25-page report also addressed human
rights, media and the overall humanitarian situation. Annan proposed the
formation of a UN mission in Cote d'Ivoire, to be called MINUCI (Mission
des Nations Unies en Cote d'Ivoire).

Meanwhile thousands of people in Cote d'Ivoire continue to be affected by
spiraling violence in the west, rebel activities stifling the economy in
the north and displacement from their homes towards the south, the UN
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on
Monday. It said intensifying violence and instability in the country's
lawless west were making it increasingly difficult for aid workers to
reach civilians desperately in need of humanitarian assistance.
 
Annan's report is available at
http://ods-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N03/294/63/PDF/N0329463.pdf?OpenElement
For IRIN coverage of Cote d'Ivoire go to: http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Cote_d_Ivoire


LIBERIA: Situation continues to be volatile

Reports of fighting in Liberia continued. An attack on Zwedru town in the
eastern Grand Gedeh County the previous week had prevented the entire
region bordering Cote d'Ivoire from receiving aid, Medecins sans
Frontieres (MSF-France) reported adding that nearly 75,000 refugees, among
other vulnerable people, lived in the region. Thousands of people from the
northeastern Nimba County had also fled towards Guinea while another
30,000 people in central Bong County had fled towards the outskirts of the
capital, Monrovia. Some 50,000 people were caught between the front line
and Monrovia in Montserrado County.

Global Witness, an international NGO, said Liberia continues to
destabilise its neighbours by supporting and arming rebels. In a report on
Monday, Global Witness said the government of President Charles Taylor
regularly imported weapons in violation of UN sanctions. The report,
titled: "The Usual Suspects: Liberia's Weapons and Mercenaries in Cote
d'Ivoire and Sierra Leone", said Liberia backs two rebel groups that
operate in the west of Cote d'Ivoire since late November 2002 - the
Popular Movement of the Ivorian Great West (MPIGO) and the Movement for
Justice and Peace (MJP) and plans to use mercenaries to destabilise Sierra
Leone.

"We have uncovered information showing the Liberian government is still
actively involved in the illegal arms trade, and is the driving force
behind the training, arming and deployment of the Ivorian rebel groups
MPIGO and MJP, with Taylor calling the shots from Monrovia," said Alice
Blondel, a Global Witness campaigner. "The 'usual suspects,' including
Taylor and former RUF commander Sam 'Maskita' Bockarie, who have been
involved in previous regional insecurities, are now involved in the Cote
d'Ivoire crisis and are planning to undermine the fragile peace in Sierra
Leone".

Meanwhile fighting northwest of Monrovia subsided on Monday, after
government forces repulsed rebels from the Ricks camp for the displaced
and some of the internally displaced persons (IDPs) had reportedly started
returning to the camp. There were, however, reports of heavily armed
rebels 27 km from Monrovia. The UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Liberia,
Marc Destanne de Bernis, and the head of the Office for Coordination of
Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Muktar Ali Farah, visited IDP camps in
Montserrado County.

On Monday, OCHA reported that the whereabouts of most of the 87
humanitarian workers and 5,268 refugees, returnees and third-country
nationals (TCNs) who were dispersed by fighting in northeastern Liberia
last week were still unknown. The refugees, returnees and TCNs, who had
fled recent fighting in western Cote d'Ivoire, had been in a transit camp
in Grand Gedeh County.

The Global Witness report can be found at
http://www.globalwitness.org/reports For IRIN coverage of Liberia go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Liberia


SIERRA LEONE: UNHCR opens new refugee camp in Kenema
 
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) opened a new refugee camp
with a capacity of 10,000 people near Tobanda village, Kenema District on
Monday. It will be managed by the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) and was
the eighth camp established by UNHCR in Sierra Leone after Largo,
Bandajuma, Gerihun, Gondama, Jembe, Jimmi Bagbo and Taiama. These camps
together currently host at least 55,000 refugees.

In a related development, representatives of humanitarian agencies signed
an agreement with Sierra Leone's health authorities to control the spread
of the deadly Lassa fever in refugee camps in the southern and eastern
part of the country. Under the agreement, the Ministry of Health would
increase medical stocks for treating the disease and work with the US
Centre for Disease Control which will handle laboratory implementation,
staff training, disease prevention and control. Since February, more than
2,000 suspected cases of Lassa Fever, an acute viral heamorrhagic fever,
had been reported in refugee camps located in the southern district of Bo
and Kenema.

At the Security Council, the mandate of the UN Mission in Sierra Leone
(UNAMSIL) was extended on 28 March by six months to 30 September. The
Council also urged the Presidents of the Mano River Union (MRU) member
states to resume dialogue and build regional peace and security. The MRU
comprises Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea.

The full resolution is posted at:
http://www.un.org/New/Press/docs/2003/sc7710.doc.htm>
For IRIN stories on Sierra Leone go to: http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Sierra_Leone


WEST AFRICA: Church leaders urge US and UN to support MRU
 
A nine-man delegation of church and grassroots leaders from The Gambia,
Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone completed a two-week mission to the
United States and United Nations where they appealed for greater
international support for the critical needs of West Africa's MRU
subregion, the Church World Service (CWS) reported on Wednesday. They met
US government and UN officials, church leaders, NGO and public audiences
and told them there could be no sustainable development in West Africa
without an immediate end to hostilities and without durable peace.

"They met US Assistant Secretary for African Affairs, Walter Kansteiner in
Washington, who talked about Liberia's role in the region's trouble," CWS
said. "Kansteiner said the US policy toward Liberia was first that of
"containment" and second, the rebuilding of civil society within Liberia.
[He] said the US has made propositions for free, fair and open elections
to Liberian President Charles Taylor, but Taylor hasn't responded." They
held a roundtable discussion with Yvette Stevens, UN Special Coordinator
for Africa and the Least Developed Countries, who told them and 50 key UN
officials and representatives of faith-based non-governmental
organizations that "conflict and development are mortal enemies".

The MRU is the focus of CWS's five-year Africa Initiative. The initiative,
to start in 2004, will target three vulnerable populations: children,
people living with HIV/AIDS, and uprooted peoples, including refugees,
migrants and internally displaced persons.
 
Details are available at: 


NIGERIA: Concerns about rights violations as elections approach

Weeks before federal and state elections in Nigeria, Amnesty International
and the Nigerian Legal Defense and Assistance Project (LEPAD) on Monday
expressed concern about human rights violations and an increase in
political violence. The two organisations said reports of political
violence, including the assassination of political leaders, clashes
between supporters of different political persuasions - both within
political parties and between rival parties - and the intimidation and
harassment of candidates and sympathisers had risen considerably in recent
months.

They called on the international community to express publicly its concern
about mounting political violence during the elections and urged
governments to prioritize the assessment made by national and
international observers of the human rights situation in Nigeria during
the elections in their contacts with the Nigerian government.

Another rights organisation, Human Rights Watch (HRW) condemned a recent
invasion by armed men of the home of the leader of the Movement for the
Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), a minority rights group in the Niger
Delta, southeastern Nigeria. In a statement on Friday, HRW said the
invasion of Ledum Mitee's home by eight heavily armed men was evidence of
the urgent need to protect critics of the government ahead of the general
elections.

In the southeastern Imo State, at least seven members of a group
campaigning for an independent Biafra were killed on Saturday during a
confrontation with the police. More than 5,000 members of the Movement for
the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) were traveling
in a convoy of about 130 cars and buses to a rally when they were
confronted by heavily armed police at Umololo village in Imo State. The
told reporters the group had attempted to disarm the police but MASSOB
said on Monday the police had opened fire unprovoked on their convoy of
vehicles, killing 50 members.

Meanwhile, with just two weeks to go before the first in a series of
elections in Nigeria, "crucial aspects of the electoral process are
unresolved" and poor preparations may mar the polls, election monitors of
the US-based Carter Centre and National Democratic Institute (NDI) said on
Friday. They expressed concern that the voters' register was not yet ready
and that there was no "well-publicised national security plan" to deal
with a growing wave of political violence.

Elections to Nigeria's federal parliament are to be held 12 April followed
on 19 April by presidential polls and elections to the post of state
governor. Should a second round be required to determine the country's
president, it is to be held on 26 April, followed on 3 May by elections to
state legislatures.

For IRIN coverage of Nigeria go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Nigeria
The HRW report is available at: http://www.amnesty.org


TOGO: New report on child-trafficking

Human Rights Watch released a report documenting the trafficking of
children in Togo, in particular girls used as domestics and market vendors
and boys made to work as labourers on farms. The report dated April 2003,
and titled: 'Borderline Slavery Child Trafficking in Togo', notes that
hundreds of trafficked children are either sent from, received in or
transited through Togo. The children were often recruited on false
promises of education, professional training and paid employment. They
were transported within and across national borders under sometimes
life-threatening conditions, ordered into hazardous, exploitative labor
and subjected to physical and mental abuse by their employers.

The report documents four routes of child trafficking into, out of, and
within Togo, including:
- the trafficking of Togolese girls to Gabon, Benin, Nigeria, and Niger;
- the trafficking of girls within Togo, especially to the capital, Lome.
- the trafficking of girls from Benin, Nigeria, and Ghana to Togo;
- the trafficking of boys to Nigeria, Benin and Cote d'Ivoire.

The full report is posted at:
http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/togo0403/togo0303.htm#P103_4323


NIGER: Choosing between arms and development

Niger's Arms for Development Project destroyed 103 small arms handed in by
people in N'Guigmi region of southeastern Niger on 18 March, marking a new
phase in the UNDP supported Program for Coordination and Assistance for
Security and Development in Africa (PCASED), based in Bamako, Mali. The
project had since 2001 been in the awareness-building phase and hopes that
by its completion in October 2003, about 5,000 weapons would have been
collected and destroyed.

The project is being carried out at N'Guigmi, 1500 km east of the Niger
capital, Niamey, on the border with Niger's eastern neighbour, Chad. Both
countries have had rebel wars. Armed conflict between government forces
and fighters from Saharan communities - Toubou, Tuareg and Arab - in Niger
started in 1991 and ended in 1998. Chad has been plagued by war since
1965. The project is linked to a moratorium which the Economic Community
of West African States (ECOWAS) imposed on the import, manufacture and
export of small arms in 1998.

The full story is available at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33225&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=NIGER


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