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

Tel: +225 22-40-4440
Fax: +225 22-41-9339
e-mail: irin-wa@irin.ci


WEST AFRICA
IRIN-WA Weekly Roundup 204
29 November - 5 December 2003


CONTENTS:

COTE D'IVOIRE: Disarmament to begin on 15 December
SENEGAL: 180 have disappeared in Casamance - Amnesty
MAURITANIA: Protest at opposition trial
GUINEA: Army officers arrested
LIBERIA: Do not rush disarmament, RI says
NIGERIA: Commonwealth meeting begins
LIBERIA-SIERRA LEONE: Interpol issues warrant for Taylor


COTE D'IVOIRE: Disarmament to begin on 15 December

Cote d'Ivoire's President Laurent Gbagbo said on Thursday that the
disarmament of rebel forces occupying the north of the country would begin
on 15 December, in a surprise announcement after a meeting with government
and rebel military commanders in the capital, Yamoussoukro.

The talks, attended by Prime Minister Seydou Diarra and top commanders
from French and West African peacekeeping forces, followed four days of
rising tension in the economic hub Abidjan.

The start of disarmament could pave the way for the government to restore
its administration to the rebel-held north and reunite the broad-based
government that the rebels joined in April. The rebels pulled out of the
government in September protesting that Gbagbo had failed to implement key
aspects of a January peace accord and had refused to delegate effective
power to the coalition cabinet.

Tension rose in Abidjan when 200 hardline youth supporters of Gbagbo
attempted to march across the frontline to "liberate" Bouake on Sunday,
accompanied by 100 Ivorian government soldiers. French peacekeepers
stopped them, engaging in a firefight with the soldiers.

Militia-style youth groups known as "Young Patriots" subsequently staged
demonstrated outside the French military base near Abidjan airport,
demanding the departure of France's 4,000 peacekeepers from Cote d'Ivoire,
for four days.

A UN mission is currently in Cote d'Ivoire to evaluate the situation in
the country and present a report to Secretary General Kofi Annan on how
the UN can enhance its role.

For IRIN coverage of the Ivorian crisis go to:  
http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Cote_d_Ivoire


SENEGAL: 180 have disappeared in Casamance - Amnesty

Amnesty International said on Thursday that from 1992-2001, about 180
people disappeared in the Casamance region of southern Senegal that lies
between Gambia and the Guinea-Bissau border, where a 22-year old low
intensity bush war between the Senegalese army and separatist guerrillas
is going on.

Amnesty blamed about 100 of the disappearances on the army and about 80 on
the Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance (MFDC), the rebel movement
that has fought for the independence of Casamance since 1981.

Amnesty highlighted the human rights situation in Casamance as it
published a report that chronicled the lives of seven women in the region
who had suffered as a result of the conflict. The report said they were
victims of sexual violence by the rebels and four of them had seen their
husbands disappear after being detained by government forces. One lost her
husband to the rebels.

For the full story go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=38243&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=SENEGAL


MAURITANIA: Haidalla trial continues

The trial of Mauritanian opposition leader, Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidalla,
along with 14 collaborators started on Monday in the capital Nouakchott.
However as at Friday afternoon, no verdict had been reached.

The men are accused of "conspiracy to destroy or change the government",
"committing acts exposing Mauritania to a war declaration" and "complicity
with a foreign power."

On Tuesday, the collective of lawyers walked out of court in support of
one of the lawyers who had sent out for contempt of court, forcing a
suspension of hearings.

Most of the accused made their first court appearance this week.

Ould Haidalla first appeared in court on Monday in a lengthy session that
only ended in the evening when Haidalla, who had been fasting, proved too
weak to answer questions. A former army colonel who ran this large desert
state from 1980-84, he was detained along with several supporters after
winning 18.67 percent of the votes in the 7 November presidential
elections. Incumbent President Maaouya Ould Sid’Ahmed Taya, who overthrew
him in 1984, won 66 percent of votes.

If found guilty, the men could spend life in prison.

For the full story go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=38199&SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=MAURITANIA


GUINEA: Army officers arrested

Many army officers and soldiers were arrested in the interior of Guinea in
a wave of arrests which began on Wednesday night in the capital, Conakry.
The arrests began three weeks after President Lansana Conte warned the
army against plotting a coup to oust him.

Conte, 69 and in poor health, came to power himself in a military coup 19
years ago but is seeking a further seven-year term in elections on 21
December. All the main opposition parties have boycotted the poll in
protest at his refusal to appoint a genuinely independent electoral
commission and allow opposition candidates free access to state television
and radio.

For IRIN coverage of Guinea go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Guinea


LIBERIA: Do not rush disarmament, RI says

The proposed disarmament in Liberia by the United Nations could run into
problems if peacekeepers are insufficient and rehabilitation programmes
not in place to ensure that combatants are successfully reintegrated into
civilian life, Refugees International said on Thursday.

The UN formally launched the disarmament campaign on Monday. RI said it
was concerned that disarmament was to begin with only 5,000 UN
peacekeepers deployed. "DDRR programmes in Liberia have been implemented
unsuccessfully twice before and each time combatants took up arms again.
It is imperative that the current DDRR process is a success," RI said on
Thursday.

Raul Carrera, a disarmament officer with the UN Mission in Liberia
(UNMIL), said one camp for former government soldiers at Scheifflin
barracks near Monrovia would definitely be ready by 7 December. But
another camp for LURD rebel fighters in Tubmanburg, 50 km north of
Monrovia and a third for MODEL combatants in Buchanan, 120 km southeast of
the capital, would take longer to set up.

"Even though some of the cantonment sites will not be ready, we will
start. Already in Scheifflin in Monrovia, we have registered more than
800. We are providing food, medical services and other needs to those," he
said.

UNMIL is expected to reach its full strength of 15,000 in late February or
early March. At the moment its forces are only deployed in and around
Monrovia and along strategic highways leading to the south and the east.

Meanwhile at least 600,000 children have been immunized against measles in
the Liberian capital Monrovia and two nearby counties since peace returned
to the country in August, UNICEF said on Thursday.

The organisation said it aimed to complete coverage of Montserrado and
Margibi counties, just to the north of Monrovia, by the end of this year.
Boubacar Dieng, an immunization officer with UNICEF in Liberia, said the
measles campaign would be extended to Bong County in central Liberia in
January. Eventually, it would reach 1.4 million children aged between six
months and 15 years throughout the country, he added.

He said immunization teams were active in Tubmanburg, 50 km northwest of
Monrovia in Bomi County, which is controlled by the Liberians United for
Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) rebel movement. They had also begun
vaccinating children against measles in Buchanan, a port city in Grand
Bassa County, 120 km southeast of the capital, which held by the Movement
for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL), another rebel group.

In the northern town of Voinjama near the Guinean border, the
International Committee of the Red Cross said it had rehabilitated the
airstrip in order to support a series of new health and water projects in
Lofa County.

Reto Stocker, the ICRC head of delegation in Liberia, said that the
airstrip had been out of use for 14 years until an ICRC plane landed there
on a test flight on 25 November.

Lofa County, in northwestern Liberia, became off-limits for relief
agencies after LURD rebels group launched an insurgency there in 1999.
However relief agencies began returning to the remote area last October,
two months after the signing of a peace agreement to end 14 years of civil
war.

In Monrovia, a 14-member team from the International Monetary Fund (IMF)
arrived to begin consultations with the new government on economic
reforms, the Finance Ministry said on Tuesday.

The team, the first to visit the war-torn country since it was suspended
from the IMF in March, would discuss the possibility of lifting the
suspension, officials said. The IMF suspended Liberia in March, saying the
country had failed to strengthen its cooperation with the fund in the
areas of policy implementation and payments.

For IRIN coverage of Liberia go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Liberia


NIGERIA: Commonwealth meeting begins

The Commonwealth Heads of Government summit formally opened in the
Nigerian capital, Abuja, on Friday. Earlier human rights activists and
their supporters marched through Lagos on Wednesday to protest against
Nigeria's hosting of a Commonwealth summit, but they were dispersed by
riot police.

More than 1,000 activists belonging to the United Action for Democracy
(UAD), a coalition of rights and pro-democracy groups, had marched through
the centre of Lagos. They carried placards denouncing Obasanjo’s
government and the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting.

Later that day, however Queen Elizabeth, who heads the Commonwealth, an
informal grouping of former British colonies, arrived in Nigeria ahead of
Friday’s formal opening of the four-day meeting. Some 53 leaders from
around the world were expected to attend.

Before the summit, the New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW), in a
40-page report accused Obasanjo’s government of killing, torturing and
harassing its critics in the past two years.

Presidential spokeswoman Remi Oyo however denied the allegations by HRW,
dismissing them as "jaundiced and ill-conceived". She accused HRW of
publishing the report on the eve of the Commonwealth summit in order "to
precipitate discord within the august gathering and cast undeserved
aspersions on the integrity of the Nigerian government and people".

For IRIN coverage of Nigeria go to:
http://www.irinnews.org/frontpage.asp?SelectRegion=West_Africa&SelectCountry=Nigeria


LIBERIA-SIERRA LEONE: Interpol issues arrest warrant for Taylor

Interpol issued an arrest warrant on Thursday for former Liberian
president Charles Taylor at the request of the UN-backed Special Court in
Sierra Leone. Interpol (International Criminal Police) however said it was
up to individual governments to execute the warrant if they considered
that it conformed to their own national laws.

A lawyer for Taylor said that the request for Taylor to be arrested
anywhere in the world would not affect his ability to remain in Nigeria.
"Taylor is in Nigeria. There is no arrangement between the Nigerian
government and the Special Court to enable them effect the warrant of
arrest," the lawyer, Terrence Terry, said.

The Special Court was set up to try those bearing the greatest
responsibility for atrocities committed during Sierra Leone's brutal
1991-2001 civil war. It indicted Taylor earlier this year for his role in
arming, financing and manipulating the country's Revolutionary United
Front (RUF) rebel movement.

The Nigerian government reacted angrily to Interpol's issue of an arrest
warrant for Taylor. Remi Oyo, a spokeswoman for Nigerian President
Olusegun Obasanjo, told the French news agency, AFP, that Nigeria would
not be pressured into handing him over.

The Special Court has so far indicted 13 people, of whom two, Foday Sankoh
and Sam Bockarie, have died. Bockarie, the former RUF military commander
was killed in Liberia on Taylor's orders. Sankoh, the founder and former
leader of the RUF, died in Freetown in July after a long illness.

Taylor resigned under international pressure on 11 August after rebels
battling to topple him entered Monrovia. He flew to exile in Nigeria on
the same day and now lives in the southeastern town of Calabar.


IRIN-WA
Tel: +225 22-40-4440
Fax: +225 22-41-9339
Email: IRIN-WA@irin.ci

[This Item is Delivered to the "Africa-English" Service of the UN's IRIN
humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views
of the United Nations. For further information, free subscriptions, or to
change your keywords, contact e-mail: Irin@ocha.unon.org or Web:  
http://www.irinnews.org . If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this
item, please retain this credit and disclaimer. Reposting by commercial
sites requires written IRIN permission.]

Copyright (c) UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2003


distributed by
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Center for International                  web: www.cidi.org
    Disaster Information             listserv: www.cidi.org/listsub.htm
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
West Africa                      www.cidi.org/humanitarian/irin/wafrica