Freed children to rejoin families, UNICEF says

The reunification of children released on Tuesday by Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) rebels was due to start on Thursday, according to a news release from UNICEF Sierra Leone. The children returned to Freetown to a rapturous welcome as crowds lined the streets clapping and cheering as the trucks went by. They were taken to Laka Interim Care Centre where each was given a hot bath and a change of clothes before receiving a medical check-up and preliminary counselling on Wednesday, the news release said. Radio announcements aimed at facilitating the reunification of the some 150 children with their families were started on Wednesday. The rebels had held the children captive for months, in some cases for years, according to the news release. About 90 of the released captives were children under the age of 13 years and some were very malnourished, haggard and in tattered clothes. Five of the 10 mothers in the group were thought to be teenagers with babies, one of whom was only about five days old, it said. There are some 4,000 children registered as missing by parents in the Western Area of Freetown after Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels invaded the capital in January. By the 31 July, 865 had been traced and reunified with 3,120 still recorded as missing, UNICEF said. Government calls for release of other abductees Sierra Leone's government on Wednesday called for the immediate and unconditional release of the many children and other civilians still held in captivity, according to a statement sent to IRIN. It expressed the government's deep concern about those still held in captivity and "calls upon those responsible and their partners to release them immediately and unconditionally, in accordance with their commitment under the Lome Peace Agreement." The government also welcomed the recent release of members of the UN-led mission to Occra Hills and some 200 women and children. Government reiterates position on attacks against RUF The government said it had investigated complaints of attacks on RUF positions in the east of the country. It said the investigations confirmed that neither its security forces, the pro-government Civil Defence Forces nor the Guinean authorities knew anything about the alleged incidents, according to another news release issued on Wednesday. The government also reconfirmed its commitment to the Lome peace Accord and warned that any group trying to disrupt its smooth implementation risked "severe consequences." An RUF commander, Sam Bockarie, threatened "all-out war" on Tuesday if Guinean soldiers continued their alleged attacks on his troops in the Koindu area near the border with Guinea and Liberia.