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Twelve Sierra Leonean children appealed at a meeting on Wednesday with President Kabbah for all abducted or missing children to be released and reunited with their families, according to UNICEF.
UNICEF said that 3,799 children had been registered missing in the Western Area since the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) invaded and fought for control of Freetown in January. The UN agency added that 661 children had been reunified with their parents.
“Children can change the attitude, moral stance and state of mind of adults in Sierra Leone to make them more concerned about the development of their country and to give Sierra Leone a future,” Kabbah said after the meeting, held on the UN Day of the African child.
The children also called for all the establishment of schools in all displaced camps in Sierra Leone as well as improved immunisation and primary health care services In a related development, the names of missing Sierra Leonean children were read out on an hour-long broadcast on state radio in the hope that they might be located, according to AFP.
The broadcast was an attempt to trace those children believed to have been abducted and conscripted by rebels as well as those who had escaped captivity and were living elsewhere.
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