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Refugee flood in Côte d'Ivoire adds urgency to Security Council trip to region

12 May – A United Nations Security Council mission to conflict-plagued West Africa this week was given added urgency today by a report that the number of internal refugees displaced by fighting in Côte d'Ivoire had now reached as many as 750,000.

Speaking at a press briefing, the mission' leader, Ambassador Jeremy Greenstock of the United Kingdom, said the Council was told that the situation in Côte d'Ivoire was particularly desperate in the west and northwest.

The Council heard a briefing earlier Monday by Hédi Annabi, Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, and Carolyn McAskie, UN Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator and Humanitarian Envoy for the crisis in Côte d'Ivoire.

Meanwhile, the situation in neighbouring Liberia, where the government and various rebel factions were fighting, was comparable to the worst days of the Sierra Leone conflict in 2000, Ambassador Greenstock added. He also noted that there were problems in parts of Guinea.

Holding out the possibility of deeper UN involvement to bring peace and stability, Ambassador Greenstock said the Council's last mission in 2000 showed "how much we owe, as an international community, to the ordinary people of the region to try to restore things with a further sustained effort."

The mission, from 15 to 23 of May, is slated to visit Nigeria, Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea, Liberia, Guinea-Bissau and Sierra Leone.

"The overall reason for the mission on this timing is to take forward a number of agreements for restoring peace, stability, and normality to the West African region, following, particularly and obviously, the Sierra Leone saga, which saw a deterioration in 2000, when the mission last went to West Africa," Mr. Greenstock said.

The situation next door in Liberia and parts of Guinea bordering Liberia, and, more recently, the deterioration in Côte d'Ivoire "from political fracas to an actual rebellion" showed how fragile the region was in terms of maintaining its own security and political cohesion, and in putting the interests of ordinary people first, he added.

Declaring that the main threats to stability came from Côte d'Ivoire and Liberia, Ambassador Greenstock said: "I want to produce from this mission conclusions that have a practical, and not just an exhortatory influence on what happens in West Africa."