POLITICS-LIBERIA: Tension Mounting on the Sierra Leone Border

By Lansana Fofana Reprint | | Print |

Lansana Fofana

MANO RIVER BRIDGE, Liberia, Mar 7 2003 (IPS) - Tension is mounting on the Sierra Leone/Liberia border as Liberian government forces engage rebels of the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Development (LURD) who are seeking to overthrow President Charles Taylor.

”Our troops are on red alert and would not tolerate any spill-over of the conflict into Sierra Leone,” says Brigadier Sam Mboma, the joint forces commander of the Sierra Leonean military this week.

For weeks now, LURD rebels have been making advances inside Liberia, from the contested Mano River Bridge right on to Robertsport, less than 60 kilometres from the capital Monrovia.

The Sierra Leonean army has deployed more troops on their side of the border in anticipation of a spill over of the conflict into their territory.

Earlier this week, Liberian government helicopter gun-ships were seen hovering in the air and dropping off bombs on LURD positions.

The ground commander of the LURD forces, self-styled Captain Jungle Justice told IPS on the border on the bridge that his forces were poised to take Monrovia in a couple of weeks.

”Taylor can engage us in air, sea and land battle but we’ll surely march on Monrovia,” he said.

On the Sierra Leonean side of the border, civilians are apprehensive. They fear that a spill over of the conflict in their villages and towns may dislodge them and send them into refuge. A helicopter gunship attack on Sunday night sent hundreds of the civilians packing.

At the moment, though, the situation is pretty fluid. The rebels main supply route from Monrovia has been cut off and the Sierra Leonean authorities are not allowing them to cross the border into Sierra Leone to forage for food as they used to do before.

Major Mamadi Keita, an infantry commander at the border post, told IPS ”We refrain from interfering in the internal affairs of Liberia but if their fighting forces attempt exporting their war into Sierra Leone we will react appropriately”.

The major casualty of this stand-off are civilians wanting to flee into safer zones, even if that means crossing against all odds into neighbouring Sierra Leone and Guinea. Aid workers told IPS hundreds of civilians are virtually being held hostage and prevented from crossing the border by the LURD fighters.

”It is not that we prevent these people from crossing into Sierra Leone,” says Capt Jungle Justice. ”They tell us they prefer staying in Liberia rather than moving on to Sierra Leone where they are not certain what will happen to them.”

Refugees disagreed. ”We are talking here about thousands of civilians,” says Mary Gblah, who crossed in this week using bush path.

This latest military situation has forced thousands of refugees into crossing the border. An official of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Enoch Ochalli told IPS that more than 7,000 refugees from Liberia are the latest arrivals. They use both official and unofficial entry points to make their way into Sierra Leone.

”We receive them at crossing points such as Gbah and Dar es Salaam in the Pujehun district and ensure they are taken subsequently to camps further inland,” Ochalla said.

But it seems the problem is bound to mount. At the moment about 12,000 refugees are believed to be sheltering in the border region with little or no facilities, which are mostly clustered along the Pujehun and kailahun axis, the main entry points from Liberia. Efforts are now being made by the UNHCR and other aid agencies to move the refugees further inland, something the refugees frown at.

A disturbing fall-out of the border crisis is the use or abuse of refugees both adults and children as cheap labourers in the diamond mines of Pujehun district. Many have families to take care of and are willing to do whatever just to make ends meet.

”This situation is hard to control because the refugees are desperate and looking out for anything that will make them survive even if that means sending their children to the minefields,” remarks Germaine Bartiono, the UNHCR repatriation officer in Kenema, Eastern Sierra Leone.

The porous Sierra Leone/Liberia border is vulnerable to acts of arms and gunrunning. The Sierra Leonean navy has grounded all fishing vessels suspected of clandestinely shipping in arms and ammunition and they have also blocked off all entry leaving official points for refugees and not combatants.

Lack of necessary logistics for the LURD rebels, who launched their armed attack in 1999 to unseat the government of President Taylor, is clearly hampering their progress on the battlefront.

Analysts predict a spread of the conflict possibly in the sub-region if the Liberian conflict is not given urgent attention that it deserves.