POLITICS-SIERRA LEONE: All Remaining Hostages Set Free By Rebels

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

FREETOWN, Aug 11 1999 (IPS) - The last group of 37 hostages, including UN military observers, captured by a rebel group in Sierra Leone last week, have been released.

The hostages were released Tuesday after intensive negotiations between British authorities who had five senior military officers of UN Military Observer Mission In Sierra Leone (UNOMSIL) among the hostages, and the rebel high command, the Sierra Leonean government and West African leaders.

The hostages, who include several Nigerian soldiers, a Ghanian, a Malaysian, a Russian and a Kyrgzy national, were kidnapped on Aug 4 when the team drove to Okra Hills, about 70 kilometres north of Freetown, to collect some 200 children abducted by the rebels in January.

The crisis lasted for about a week, but the drama has unfolded several complex strands in the peace deal signed Jul 7, between the government and the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) in the Togolese capital of Lome.

The abductors, who were mostly from the former Sierra Leone Army (SLA), the renegades from the soldiers who fled into the bush, after their Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) junta was toppled in February 1998, have succeeded in articulating specific demands, which were not considered in the peace deal.

They want the case of the SLA, as distinct from the RUF, to be sufficiently addressed. For instance, the RUF clinched eight ministerial jobs in the proposed government of national unity to be set up by the government of President Tejan Ahmed Kabbah and the rebels.

The RUF leader, Foday Sankoh, also bagged the prestigious job of chairman of strategic Resources and National Reconstruction, a position equivalent to that of the country’s vice-president.

The SLA rebels asked for a review of the Lome accord to grant their outfit political concessions.

“This is a clear indications that there is a split in the rebel movement. And it is this crack that has the potential of derailing the peace process,” comments John Kandeh, a Freetown- based political analyst.

According to diplomatic sources, no ransoms were paid to the hostage takers but promises were made to urgently respond to their demand for food and medicines, in their northern jungle base of Okra Hills, where the hostages were taken.

In addition, the rebels’ demand to meet their estranged leader, Major Johnny Paul Koroma, who was chairman of the AFRC, has been acknowledged by the negotiators.

President Charles Taylor of Liberia, who has often been accused of backing Sierra Leone’s rebels, has promised to provide a plane to fly the AFRC/SLA rebels to the Liberian capital of Monrovia, to meet their leader, Koroma.

Also released with the 20 West African Peace-Keeping Force ECOMOG, 10 UNOMSIL and three local journalists were 200 children and women, who had been held since January by the rebels when they invaded the capital, Freetown.

According to the UN Children’s Fund (Unicef), the majority of the released children looked emaciated and sick. “They have all been examined by medical doctors before being reunited with their families,” a spokesperson for Unicef told IPS Wednesday.

One key question that the hostage crisis has raised is that of disarmament, encampment and eventual reintegration of ex- combatants.

An Economic Commission of West African States (ECOWAS) foreign ministers meeting in Freetown last week, recommended the immediate disarmament of combatants, as provided for in the Lome peace accord.

Since its signing, rebel forces have refused to hand over their weapons to ECOMOG and UNOMSIL who are mandated to carry out the exercise.

“We need to speed up the disarmament process and other aspects of the implementation of the peace accord,” said ECOWAS Executive- Secretary, Lansana Kouyateh.

There is widespread fear in Freetown that the 10,000 strong SLA rebels holed up at Okra Hills constitute a serious danger to the capital, which is only 70 kilometres away.

This fear has been compounded by the fact that the RUF, which began its bush war in 1991, Tuesday alleged that Guinean troops have been attacking their positions in eastern Sierra Leone.

RUF commander, Gen. Sam Bockarie, has threatened “an all-out war and a total disruption of the peace process, if urgent steps are not taken within 48 hours to halt the attacks”.