|
|
UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs |
LIBERIA: Peacekeepers deploy in volatile central Liberia
MONROVIA, 11 September 2003 (IRIN) - Thousands of displaced civilians, who fled renewed fighting between government forces and rebels a week ago in central Liberia, began returning to their camps following the deployment of West African peacekeepers in Bong County on Wednesday.
ECOMIL Spokesman Major Ogun Sanya told IRIN on Thursday that the peacekeeping force had fully deployed along the road from Kakata, 45 km north of the capital, Monrovia to Totota, 64 km further north.
"Displaced persons are free to return to Totota. In fact we have set up checkpoints around the camps there. Their security is assured," the spokesman said.
Some 650 soldiers from Guinea-Bissau and a company from Nigeria had been deployed in the area, he added.
Over 50,000 internally displaced people (IDPs) fled four large camps in Totota, 109 km north of the capital, Monrovia, and moved southwards to Salala because of fighting between the government and rebels of the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD).
"We received news from our partners in rural Liberia that the IDPs have now begun their journey back to the camps, because ECOMIL [the West African Peacekeepers] deployed in Totota," Ross Mountain, United Nations Special Humanitarian Coordinator told a news conference in Monrovia on Thursday.
"It is unacceptable that these internally displced persons (IDPs), already displaced should find themselves once more caught in the crossfire," Mountain had said on Wednesday following reports of renewed outbursts of violence in Kakata.
He had called on combatants inside the country's interior region to stop fighting as sporadic clashes between government forces and rebel militia continued to threaten civilians and relief workers and impeded aid distribution.
In Monrovia, UN agencies including the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), World Food Programme (WFP), the UN Joint Logistics Committee, UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and ECOMIL commenced transporting IDPs from schools to camps on the city's western outskirts.
The exercise, which commenced on Thursday, targets the transfer of at least 30,000 civilians who have been living in 116 temporary shelters and buildings in and around the capital.
Most of them took refuge in schools, churches and public buildings during attacks by LURD rebels on city's western suburbs in June-July.
Relief workers estimate that more than 100,000 IDPs were in eight camps outside Monrovia before the June fighting.
Last week, the government gave a 15 September ultimatum to the displaced in Monrovia to move out of the temporary shelters especially school buildings, to allow the schools to reopen for the next school year which runs from October-June.
However, some IDP leaders told IRIN that they would not return to the camps unless adequate security protection was provided in the camps.
UNHCR said it had provided ECOMIL with additional cars and communication equipment to carry out daily patrol of IDP Camps to ensure security.
Meanwhile more than 250 soldiers from Benin soldiers arrived in Monrovia to beef up ECOMIL's strength of over 2,500 soldiers from Ghana, Guinea Bissau, Mali, Nigeria and Senegal. Additional troops are expected from Togo later this week.
Themes: (IRIN) Conflict
[ENDS]
The material contained on this Web site comes to you via IRIN, a UN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations or its agencies. If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post any item on this site, please retain this credit and disclaimer. Quotations or extracts should include attribution to the original sources. All graphics and Images on this site may not be re-produced without the express permission of the original owner. All materials copyright © UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2003
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
