Africa, Development & Aid, Global, Global Geopolitics, Headlines, North America

POLITICS: US Relief Groups Urge Bush to Deploy Forces in Liberia

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Aug 13 2003 (IPS) - U.S. relief and development agencies continue to urge President George W. Bush to immediately deploy more soldiers to Monrovia to make Liberia’s capital city secure for the delivery of "desperately needed” humanitarian aid, a possibility that is under discussion, a U.S. official said Tuesday.

In a letter to Bush, Mary McClymont, president and CEO of InterAction, which represents 160 U.S. agencies, said reports of continued fighting in the countryside and renewed attempts to ship arms into Liberia "raise serious doubts” about the duration of the informal cease-fire that took effect as some 800 Nigerian peace-keeping troops arrived last weekend.

"We believe that an American military presence in the capital will be necessary to stabilise the situation there and enable the subsequent pacification of the remainder of the country by the United Nations peacekeeping force, once it is in place," wrote McClymont on Monday.

If U.S. forces are not deployed, she warned, "we risk that Monrovia will again become a battleground, resulting in further loss of life and continued suffering for the people of Liberia".

All sides in the civil conflict that has wracked Liberia and several of its West African neighbours for much of the past 13 years have appealed for Washington to deploy troops on the ground in order to give greater momentum to the peacekeeping effort.

"My message to President Bush is: ‘please, President Bush, come and save Liberia’," said Taylor’s successor and long-time comrade-in-arms, Moses Blah, Monday. "We are suffering. We are dying," he told the Cable News Network (CNN).

Bush has been strongly criticised at home for not intervening in Liberia during his trip to Africa last month, particularly by Democrats and leaders of the African-American community, who stress Liberia’s close historical links to the United States and its staunch support for Washington during World War Two and the Cold War.

Three U.S. warships carrying some 2,300 Marines were anchored Tuesday offshore from Monrovia’s port, which is controlled by rebel forces, which promised Tuesday to quit the capital by noon Thursday. The ships’ appearance has raised hopes that the Marines may yet come ashore to ensure the security of the port and the delivery of humanitarian assistance that is warehoused there.

On Tuesday, Associated Press quoted a "senior defence official" who said discussions were underway with West African peacekeepers about sending a small number of additional troops into the battered country.

About 100 Marines are currently ashore, said the report.

Secretary of State Colin Powell, who has made no secret of his wish that Bush order troops to participate in peacekeeping in Liberia, said Monday the Marines may secure the port in light of the "desperate need for food to be delivered", but he appeared to deliberately lower expectations for a major commitment of troops.

"If the situation remains calm, as it has been for the last few hours, all this should be done in a rather open and peaceful way," he said. "And if the cease-fire remains in place, I would not expect any large commitment of troops."

On Tuesday, Blah appealed for the rebels, who belong to two major groups and are believed to hold about 75 percent of Liberia’s territory, to join a government of national unity pending the establishment of a new interim government in October.

The rebels so far have rejected the offer, calling instead for the government to turn over power to them. "We were responsible for the downfall of Charles Taylor," Sekou Fofana, a rebel officer told reporters in Monrovia. "That means we can be president of the interim government."

Such exchanges add to concerns that renewed fighting could break out any time which, in turn, heightens the pressure on Washington to send in its troops to give the cease-fire more muscle, a move the Pentagon has strongly resisted for the past month. It argues that U.S. military forces are already over-stretched globally, and that deploying more in Liberia without a clear and quick "exit strategy" would create a precedent that would only add to the force’s burdens.

The relief agencies described the situation as "increasingly dire" for the civilian population, saying the nutritional status of the population in Monrovia – which has swollen from 600,000 to an estimated one million people in just the past few months – is deteriorating quickly.

The lack of access to clean water and worsening sanitary conditions could result in the outbreak of a cholera epidemic that could be devastating under the current circumstances, they warn.

The U.N. Children’s Fund (UNICEF) reported from Monrovia on Tuesday that tens of thousands of children on the streets of the capital are living in "absolutely horrifying" conditions that have deteriorated sharply since June, when aid workers were evacuated as rebel forces approached the city.

UNICEF said the recent wave of fighting has displaced some 250,000 people, who have no food or water. Children "are in a situation where they have no choice. Either they die from exhaustion, through lack of nourishment or they die from the bullets of child soldiers enrolled in (the) two rival factions," said UNICEF spokesperson Damien Personnaz.

Hundreds of people have been killed in fighting over the past month, while as many as 600,000 have been displaced by the war, according to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

The misery and insecurity are also found in neighbouring countries. The U.S. Committee for Refugees (USCR) reported last week, for example, that some 50,000 Liberian refugees uprooted by the conflict are in desperate need of emergency humanitarian assistance, and are subject to attacks and forcible recruitment by rebel factions along a 500-km corridor near the border with Cote d’Ivoire.

Some say the administration’s timidity is feeding the growing perception overseas that Washington cares little for the interests of other countries, particularly in Africa.

"This feeds into the wider debate within the international community about what the United States really cares about," Gayle Smith, the National Security Council’s director for African affairs in the Clinton administration, told the ‘Washington Post’ this week.

"When we’re telling countries they have to be for us or against us, it hurts our credibility if we are not responsive when the rest of the world is saying there’s something they need us to do."