UNHCR staff evacuated from Lofa

All UNHCR staff working in Lofa County in northwest Liberia were evacuated to Monrovia on Saturday at the government's insistence, a UNHCR spokesman in Abidjan told IRIN on Monday. "Fifteen international and local staff have all left the area and I'm afraid it will be for some time," Marcellin Hepie, UNHCR Senior Programme Officer in West Africa, said. There are some 30,000 refugees in the area. Defence minister says towns, villages are being destroyed Defence Minister Daniel Chea said on Monday that towns and villages were being burned in Lofa County and charged that shots were being fired from across the border with Guinea, the BBC reported. Government forces, he said, were trying to dislodge the rebels from Voinjama, a key town in Lofa. "We are not going to be intimidated," Chea told the BBC. Asked if Liberia would attack Guinea, he said: "I did not say that but we will use every means at our disposal to expel the dissidents." On Sunday, the government claimed that its troops had regained complete control of the north-west and dislodged all rebel forces from the area. News organisations reported that some 1,000 rebels attacked government forces with heavy weapons early on Saturday. No information has been released on casualties, but the fighting was said to be heavy. Guinea denies Liberian allegation The head of the Guinean Consulate in Monrovia, Joseph Tolno, denied on Friday that the rebels came from there, saying that Guinea had no interest in allowing dissidents to destabilise Liberia, Star Radio reported. Liberia complains formally to the UN On Wednesday, the Liberian government sent a letter addressed to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and the UN Security Council protesting "an armed incursion from the Republic of Guinea". It also said Liberia had submitted a protest note to Guinea's government asking it "to bring this situation under control". It added that the Liberian government reserved the right "to defend its territorial integrity against such aggression". Identity of the group remains unclear Meanwhile, the identities of the people behind the attacks remain unclear. According to Reuters there is speculation in Monrovia that they could be led by a former warlord from the seven-year civil war which formally ended with elections in 1997. A spokesman for the group, who identified himself as Mosquito Spray, called the BBC on Friday claiming responsibility for the incursion, but did not say who its leaders were.