Navy Division
The Liberian National Coast Guard, the military establishment's seaborne element, began operations in 1959 after the de livery of two 40-foot patrol boats from the United States. According to the act of the legislature that created the coast guard, it was responsible for protecting lives and property at sea, preventing smuggling, aiding navigation, and enforcing pollution standards within the 200-nautical-mile limit of Liberia's territorial waters. The coast guard had law enforcement jurisdiction in Liberian ter ritorial waters and was empowered to prevent any persons from entering the country "when it was believed that the presence of such persons would endanger the security of the state."
The assistant minister for coast guard affairs in the Ministry of National Defense oversaw the force. In 1984 this position was held by Captain S. Weaka Peters, a former commandant of the coast guard. Patrick D. Wallace, the commandant in 1984, led a force consisting of six patrol craft and some 450 officers and rat ings, who were organized into three major commands: the Coast Guard Base Unit, the Task Force Unit, and the Port Security/ Search and Rescue Unit. In addition, since 1977 the coast guard has also been responsible for operating the nation's network of coastal lighthouses. The Task Force Unit included three 50?ton, Swedish-built coastal patrol craft that were delivered in 1980 as well as three smaller American?built patrol craft delivered in 1976. The relatively small size of the Liberian vessels limited their use to coastal waters. The craft were usually based at Elijah Johnson Coast Guard Base at Freeport in Monrovia, but they could operate from coast guard bases at Buchanan, Greenville, and Cape Palmas.
In 1984 the coast guard was considered to be the best trained and most professional component of the AFL. It was handicapped, however, by a lack of funding to maintain all vessels in the inventory. The serviceability of the fleet was also hampered by a reluctance on the part of the Swedish government to provide spare parts for the craft it had supplied. Thus, only one of the Swedish patrol craft was operational, and the other two had been immobilized by the lack of spare parts.
In late 2002 the Navy Division of the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL), under the command of Lt. General Roland Duo, recaptured the strategic town of Kolahun in northern Lofa County from the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD). General Roland Duo, General Frontline Commander of the Armed Forces of Liberia, is also Chief of Staff of the Navy Division of the Armed Forces of Liberia [as of October 2002]. For nearly two years the strategic town of Kolahun in northern Lofa County had been under siege by LURD. Finally, President Charles Taylor speaking at a news conference in Monrovia, announced that government troops were in full control of Kolahun and the strategic town of Foya. The recapture of the two key cities followed clashes between the Navy division of the Armed Forces of Liberia (AFL) under the command of General Roland Duo and LURD forces. On October 21, 2002 a team of local and foreign journalists visited the embattled Lofa region on a fact-finding mission.
