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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IRIN-WA Weekly Round-Up 3 of Main Events for West Africa covering the period 15-21 January 1999
SIERRA LEONE: Insecurity at port slows humanitarian deliveries
Humanitarian agencies have been unable to provide urgently needed food to thousands of Freetown residents because of snipers in the main port area after the West African intervention force (ECOMOG) wrested back the facility from Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels.
WFP added on Thursday that aid agency warehouses in the port area had been badly damaged. Continued sniping has prevented aid workers from checking their stores. As a result, a WFP spokesman told IRIN on Thursday that a ship carrying some 1,800 mt of Italian donated rice for distribution to the city's war-weary population was off-loaded in the Guinean capital, Conakry.
However, humanitarian sources said a Nigerian supply ship had docked at the port and a British Royal Navy ship, the HMS Norfolk, has also flown in medicines to the city.
Lack of security guarantees hinders humanitarian work.
Despite numerous appeals to all parties in the conflict, aid agencies have reported they have still not received guaranteed safe passage for relief workers, WFP Regional Manager Paul Ares said in a statement on Thursday. He added that the ECOMOG ban on the use of telecommunications equipment by aid workers was also severely hampering humanitarian work. ECOMOG has said it banned use of the equipment because some aid bodies used radios to pass on information to the rebels.
Some 40,000 people crammed into stadium
Residents of Freetown's east side who lost their homes and other possessions, have sought safety in the western and central parts of the city. They are now living in abandoned buildings or makeshift camps. Between 30,000 and 40,000 people are now estimated jammed into Freetown's main stadium without food and medical facilities, WFP said.
Humanitarian sources said the city's main Connaught Hospital was barely functional and there was a serious shortage of surgical supplies. The HMS Norfolk delivered three mt of medical supplies to Freetown on Friday 15 January.
Britain's Foreign Secretary Robin Cook announced on Tuesday that his government had released US $1.6 million for humanitarian aid to Sierra Leone. A UN inter-agency mission flew to Freetown on Thursday to assess the humanitarian situation in the city.
Meanwhile, volunteers began burying an estimated 1,100 corpses on Thursday that had been collected from central Freetown, the German news agency DPA said. UNICEF has provided diesel fuel to the corpse removal effort. The agency has also provided Public Health Unit (PHU) kits to reactivate four clinics in the city's west side, including Netlands Hospital and King Harmnon Road Clinic.
Situation outside Freetown
Outside the capital, rebel activity near the southeastern town of Kenema has spurred fresh arrivals of internally displaced persons (IDPs). Last week's estimates of IDP's in the town were 36,000 but have now risen to 50,000. Many of the new arrivals are wounded people, humanitarian sources said. UN agencies and NGOs, which met in Guinea on 16 January, agreed to deliver medical supplies to the town.
Food supplies precarious
The Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) warned on Monday that the food supply situation was precarious outside the capital because supplies had been disrupted by the fighting in Freetown. The agency said poor infrastructure and insecurity would also severely hamper the marketing of December's main rice crop. Continued fighting is will likely hinder agricultural rehabilitation activities planned for 1999, FAO added.
Inter-agency teams are due to travel to Kenema and Freetown today (Friday) to assess humanitarian needs. A report from UN Humanitarian Coordinator Elizabeth Lwanga said the Kenema mission will deliver shelter, medicine and therapeutic feeding material
British support for ECOMOG
Britain's Foreign Secretary Robin Cook said on Tuesday that in additional to humanitarian help to the Freetown government, Britain had shared intelligence information and maps with ECOMOG.
Earlier this month Britain announced a US $1.6 million grant to Sierra Leone and ECOMOG, which has pushed the rebels out of Freetown and has blocked their retreat to the country's interior, news reports said. Further underpining Britain's support, British High Commissioner in Sierra Leone Peter Penfold told Reuters the British government had been "fully supporting" ECOMOG, flying in logistical equipment, communications facilities and vehicles.
Penfold, who visited Freetown briefly on Wednesday from his temporary station in neighbouring Guinea, said: "We need to help galvanise the government of Sierra Leone and the people to help them get back on their feet". He was speaking after visiting Freetown's main stadium.
Rebels target local journalists
Local journalists in Sierra Leone have been hunted down and some killed in cold blood by RUF and rebel army elements, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said on Wednesday. Rebels who attacked Freetown on 6 January, it said, were armed with a list of journalists "who were to
be eliminated" for their perceived anti-RUF coverage of the war.
Burkina Faso favours peace talks
Meanwhile, Burkina Faso reiterated on Thursday that the war in Sierra Leone could not be ended by military means. Foreign Ministry officials told IRIN that the preferred option was for the Freetown government and the RUF to negotiate peace. Burkina Faso chairs the Organisation of African Unity which, a government official said, would only intervene where sub-regional bodies, such as the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), failed to resolve political problems.
Okelo says Nigerian role in peace central
However, UN Special Envoy for Sierra Leone Francis Okelo told reporters on Wednesday that Nigeria, which provides the bulk of the 15,000-20,000 ECOMOG force, had a key role in resolving the conflict in Sierra Leone. Speaking on Nigerian state television following discussions in Abuja with Nigerian Foreign Affairs Minister Ignatius Olisiemeka, Okelo said: "It (Nigeria) has played a central role in the restoration of peace." The discussions centred on the contributions ECOMOG was making to end the rebellion in Sierra Leone, Reuters said.
GUINEA BISSAU: ECOWAS says 1,450 peacekeepers enough
ECOWAS Executive Secretary Lansana Kouyate said on Wednesday that the 1,450 troops jointly offered by four West African states for a subregional interposition force in Guinea Bissau should be enough to guarantee peace in the recently troubled nation.
Speaking from ECOWAS headquarters in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, Kouyate told AFP that 112 soldiers would be in place before the end of January to be joined soon after by another 600 men. The force is to be deployed under the Abuja accord and will replace Senegalese and Guinean troops who came to support Vieira's government.
Togolese Defence Minister Assani Tidjani said that officials of troop-contributing countries - Benin, The Gambia, Niger and Togo - as well as representatives from donor countries met on Tuesday in Lome to make final plans for deployment.
Meanwhile, a Military Junta official in the Guinea Bissau capital, Bissau, told Lusa, the Portuguese news agency, that ECOWAS wanted a government of national unity to be installed before the end of this week. However, on Monday, Lusa quoted the Guinea Bissau prime minister-designate, Francisco Fadul, as saying neither he nor the transitional government would take office before all Guinean and Senegalese troops had left. Under a peace deal signed by the government and self-styled Military Junta in November 1998 to end a five-month rebellion, these troops are to leave as ECOMOG troops arrive. In addition, legislative and presidential elections are to be held by the end of March 1999.
UN sending electoral needs team
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has decided to send an electoral needs assessment team to Guinea Bissau, his spokesman Fred Eckhard said on Wednesday in New York. The 10-day mission will begin at the end of January and review what help the UN could offer the country during the elections.
WFP increases flights into Bissau
WFP increased its twice-weekly chartered flights into Bissau to three due to high demand. it said that since the beginning of emergency food operations in June 1998, when fighting erupted between the government and the Junta forces, WFP had delivered 11,337 mt of food and 7,990 mt had been distributed to the needy.
The agency also said in its latest weekly 'Emergency Report' that the government recognised that large WFP deliveries of rice, which the population preferred to wheat flour, could impact the local markets negatively. The agency added that a nutritionist it consulted recommended that food aid to the country be targeted carefully. It said areas in Falacunda, Boe, Bedandal and some villages of Mansoa needed more detailed food assessment because of the local rice crop failure.
WEST AFRICA: Refugee crisis linked to socio-economic situation
To solve West Africa's refugee problem, living conditions must be improved and political stability implanted in refugee-hosting areas and countries of origin, the president of UNHCR's Executive Committee said on Saturday 16 January. At a news conference in the Ivorian capital, Abidjan, Ambassador Victor Rodriguez Cedeno described West Africa's refugee problem as inter-linked and "very complex". With some 700,000 Sierra Leoneans and Liberians, the region now has the largest refugee population in Africa. Cedeno has completed a two-week mission to Cote d'Ivoire, Guinea and Liberia. A planned visit to Sierra Leone was cancelled due to the fighting.
AFRICA: UNICEF appeals for emergency funds
UNICEF has appealed to donors for emergency assistance for women and children victims of war. Almost 50 million women and children were facing extreme danger worldwide, Nils Katsberg, UNICEF Director of Emergency Programmes, told a headquarters news briefing on Tuesday. UNICEF is asking for approximately US $136 million for emergency assistance for 20 countries in conflict or post-conflict situations worldwide. The effort is part of this year's United Nations Consolidated Appeal launched in December 1998. UNICEF has a target figure of $7,750,000 for Sierra Leone and $8,791,300 for Guinea Bissau. (Details of the 1999 UN Consolidated Inter-Agency Appeal for Guinea Bissau and Sierra Leone can be found of http://www.reliefweb.int)
UNCTAD launches project to attract foreign investors
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) launched a joint project today to help six of the world's least developed countries (LDC's) attract more foreign direct investors. The six countries - Mali, Mozambique, Uganda, Ethiopia, Madagascar and Bangladesh - are among 48 LDC's of which 33 are in Africa. Less than one percent of private foreign direct investment goes to these countries, UNCTAD said in a press release. China, Finland, France and Norway are providing financial support.
GUINEA: Concern over child trafficking
The 10-member Committee on the Rights of the Child said in Geneva on Wednesday Guinea needed to "seriously oversee" the process of adoption of children from Guinea to other countries to help stop illegal child trafficking. The committee made its preliminary observations after reviewing Guinea's implement ion of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the UN state in a statement.The committee also recommended that Guinea improve its education system, prohibit corporal punishment and review current national legislation to bring it in line with the child's rights treaty.
Guinea said the wars in Sierra Leone and Liberia, in particular, had limited Conakry's ability to protect children's rights. A government delegation at the meeting said Guinea was surrounded by six countries suffering from civil strife and had "opened its doors wide to nearly a million refugees", over 65 percent of them children. The government, the delegation added, had used funds to help the refugees. An increase in its
defence budget had curbed the amount of funding allocated to the social sectors, it added. (For more information, please see http://www.unhchr.ch)
NIGERIA: Rules set for presidential election
Nigeria's next president must be a citizen aged 40 years or over and educated to at least School Certificate level. The rules for the presidential elections were announced on Wednesday by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). The candidate must also be a member of one of Nigeria's three registered political parties, sponsored by that party and must pay the agency a non-refundable fee of 100,000 naira (around US $1,200), the rules said. The three eligible parties are the People's Democratic Party (PDP), All People's Party (APP) and Alliance for Democracy (AD). The Secretary of INEC, Adamu Bawa Mu'azu, told IRIN on Thursday he believed leaders of the three political parties were satisfied with the guidelines.
Meanwhile, state and governorship elections in Bayelsa state will now take place on 30 January, news media reported on Wednesday, quoting the head of INEC. The elections were suspended earlier this month due to civil unrest in the state. Bayelsa's elections follow a rerun election for the Rivers State governor.The People's Democratic Party (PDP) swept the Rivers poll, winning 42 of the 54 seat state assembly, Radio Nigeria-Kaduna , monitored by the BBC, said on Sunday.
Carter in Nigeria
As Nigeria nears its presidential elections due on 27 February, former US President Jimmy Carter arrived in the Nigeria on Tuesday on a joint four-day election assessment mission with the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI), news reports said.
Both organisations have monitored local and state elections in Nigeria and will also be monitoring the presidential elections due on 27 February. Carter was due to meet Nigerian military leader General Abdulsalami Abubakar Friday and representatives of the three parties participating in the National Assembly and presidential elections.
MAURITANIA: Prominent opposition leader freed
Mauritania's most prominent opposition politician, Ahmed Ould Daddah, and two of his associates were freed after a month's detention for accusing the government of agreeing to accept Israeli nuclear waste in the West African country, human rights officials told IRIN.
Daddah, chairman of the Union des forces democratiques, former minister Mohameden Ould Babah and Mohameden Ould Icheddou returned to their homes in the capital, Nouackchott, on Sunday, a day before the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The politicians were arrested on 16 December, on the eve of Ramadan, and sent to a remote desert location some 690 km east of the capital. A member of Mauritania's human rights associations told IRIN that the men were likely released because of international and national pressure. The government of President Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya has denied agreeing to accepting the nuclear waste from the Dimona nuclear power plant.
CAMEROON/BURKINA FASO: OAU donates US $1 million
The Organisation of African Unity (OAU) has donated about US $1 million to help Cameroon and Burkina Faso combat drought and famine, the PANA news agency said last Friday (15 January). Citing an OAU press statement, PANA said US $1 million will go to Cameroon to help it combat locust infestation, while Burkina Faso will receive US $84,500 for "environmental development". The money comes from OAU's special emergency assistance fund for drought and famine in Africa, PANA said.
EQUATORIAL GUINEA: Persecution of Bubi group persists, Amnesty says
A "new wave of arrests" targeting mainly the Bubi ethnic group has taken place in Equatorial Guinea, Amnesty International said. In a January 1999 report, Amnesty said at least 20 people were recently arrested, held incommunicado in the capital Malabo and reportedly tortured. The arrests followed rumours that a suspected leader of the January 1998 attacks on military barracks on Bioko island had fled by boat to Nigeria, the report said. Among those arrested were relatives and people suspected of hiding the leader or helping him flee, Amnesty said. It said some 80 people, convicted in May on the basis of confessions made under torture in connection with last year's attack, continued to be detained at Malabo's Black Beach prison in crowded cells, and 11 sentenced to death were being held in "life-threatening conditions".
Abidjan, 22 January 1999, 15:45 GMT
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