U N I T E D   N A T I O N S
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Integrated Regional Information Network for West Africa

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WEST AFRICA
IRIN-WA Weekly Roundup 175
10 - 16 May 2003


CONTENTS:

LIBERIA: UN official says civil war may engulf Monrovia if no ceasefire
COTE D'IVOIRE: Security Council creates UN military mission
NIGERIA: 25 die in political clashes in Warri
NIGER: Survey finds over 870,000 are still slaves
TOGO: Presidential campaign begins without main opposition candidate


LIBERIA: UN official says civil war may engulf Monrovia if no ceasefire

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has
warned that Liberia's civil war could engulf the capital, Monrovia, unless
President Charles Taylor and rebel forces were persuaded to negotiate an
early ceasefire.

Speaking to journalists at the UN headquarters in New York, on Thursday,
OCHA's head in Liberia, Ali Muktar Farah, said that hundreds of thousands
of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the country were desperate for
help.

His warning came a day after Ruud Lubbers, the head of the UN refugee
agency UNHCR, said that the humanitarian situation in the country was
going from bad to worse and strongly urged all the warring parties to stop
fighting before the humanitarian situation got "out of hand." Liberia was
his second stop from Cote d'Ivoire where he started his tour of five West
African nations, including Sierra Leone, Guinea and Ghana.

Early in the week, Liberia's defence minister Daniel Chea told reporters
in Monrovia that fierce fighting was going on between government forces
and rebels of the Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL) for control of
the port city of Greenville, Sinoe county, some 250 km southeast of the
capital.

According to Chea, a navy gun boat attacked the rebels from the Atlantic
Ocean. Because of this, the Liberian defense ministry had advised all
ships navigating on the its territorial waters to remain 15 nautical miles
off the shores of Greenville.

In another development, Liberian President Charles Taylor said on
Wednesday he would attend peace talks with rebel movements to be convened
by the International Contact Group on Liberia in Accra, Ghana, on 2 June.
However, government and diplomatic sources in Monrovia said the main rebel
movement, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD), had
objected to the venue citing security concerns and instead suggested that
the venue to be shifted to Dakar, Senegal.

Meanwhile, the chief of investigations at the Special Court for Sierra
Leone Alan White said on Thursday he had credible information that the
family of indicted war criminal Sam Bockarie had been killed in Liberia.
The family - which according to the Court's prosecutor David Crane
included Bockarie's wife, mother and two children - may have been
eliminated to avoid possible DNA profiling.

The Liberian government had said that Bockarie was killed in a shoot out
with government forces as he was attempting to enter the country with a
band of armed men from Cote d'Ivoire on May 6. But diplomatic sources in
Monrovia, told IRIN shortly afterwards that Bockarie was actually killed
by Taylor's security forces in Monrovia after a violent argument with the
president.

Repeated calls by the Court for cooperation by Taylor's government have
been to no avail, a statement from the Court said on Thursday.

For IRIN coverage of Liberia view:

http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Liberia

COTE D'IVOIRE: Security Council creates UN military mission

Determining that the situation in Cote d'Ivoire is a threat to
international peace and security in West Africa, the Security Council on
Tuesday decided to establish a United Nations mission in that country.

It said the new mission would include a military component, complementing
the operations of French peace-keeping forces in the country and the
forces of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).

The Council stressed that the military liaison group should be initially
composed of 26 military officers and that up to 50 additional officers
might be progressively deployed when UN Secretary General Kofi Annan
determined that there was a need and security conditions permitted. It
meanwhile postponed sending a team of its members on a tour of seven West
African countries citing logistical reasons. The mission would go ahead
within the next few weeks, a statement from the Council said.

In a move widely seen as a setback for the peace process since President
Laurent Gbagbo abolished the curfew throughout Cote d'Ivoire on 10 May,
government reimposed a curfew on two districts in the west of the country
where 68 villagers were killed in fresh outbreaks of violence.

The defence ministry said on Tuesday that it was reimposing a 10.00pm to
6.00am curfew on Duekoue, a town close to the front line with rebel forces
that control the north of the country, and a midnight to 6.00am curfew on
Guiglo, where pro-government forces have been recruiting and arming
Liberians from a nearby refugee camp.

Meanwhile, rail services from the port of Abidjan to landlocked Burkina
Faso, interrupted for eight months by the civil war in Cote d'Ivoire,
should resume by the end of May, the company which operates the line said
on Thursday. Thiam Aziz, chief executive of the French-owned company
SITARAIL, made the announcement as an inspection train returned to Abidjan
after a six-day return trip through rebel-held territory to the Burkinabe
border.

For IRIN coverage of Cote d'Ivoire see

http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Cote_d_Ivoire

NIGERIA: 25 die in political clashes in Warri

At least 25 people were killed in a fresh outbreak of political violence
in the volatile southern oil town of Warri, according to residents and
officials.

Residents said on Wednesday that the violence between supporters of the
ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP) and the rival Alliance for
Democracy (AD) broke out on Monday in the Effurun district of Warri and
continued on Tuesday. Several buildings were burned down.

Residents said heavily armed contingents of soldiers in armoured personnel
carriers and riot police had managed to restore some control by Wednesday.

On the health front, Nigeria begun screening visitors from abroad after a
Taiwanese national died of suspected severe acute respiratory syndrome
(SARS) in the northern city of Kano, health minister Alphonsus Nwosu said.

He told a news conference in Abuja on Monday that an unnamed Taiwanese
businessman, who had been visiting Nigeria for the past 20 years, died on
28 February after exhibiting SARS-like symptoms. He died shortly after
visiting the former Portuguese colony of Macao in China's Guangdong
province.

For IRIN stories on Nigeria go to

http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Nigeria

NIGER: Survey finds over 870,000 are still slaves

Although Niger recently passed new tougher laws against slavery, more than
870,000 people - about seven percent of the country's population - still
live in conditions of forced labour, according to Timidria, results of a
survey conducted by a local human rights group indicated.

The survey carried out in August last year in six of Niger's eight
administrative regions showed that 870,364 people still worked in
servitude. The vast majority - 602,000 - were in the southwestern
Tillaberry region, where the capital Niamey is situated.

Slavery is a long ingrained tradition in this poor landlocked country of
11 million people on the southern edge of the Sahara, which achieved
independence from France in 1960. Timidria said the custom was especially
prevalent amongst nomadic pastoralists of the Tuareg tribe.

For stories on Niger see

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=34073&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=NIGER

TOGO: TOGO: Presidential campaign begins without main opposition candidate

Togo launched into a two-week campaign for presidential elections on
Friday, but with Gilchrist Olympio, the main opposition candidate, barred
from standing, President Gnassingbe Eyadema looked well placed to extend
his 36-year role for a further five years.

Eyadema nevertheless faces six opposition candidates in the June 1 ballot,
including Emmanuel Bob-Kitani, the vice-president of Olympio's Union for
the Forces of Change (UFC)party. He is is standing with Olympio's blessing
as a legal proxy for Olympio himself.

For IRIN coverage of Togo see
http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Togo


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