Rebels interrupt disarmament efforts

Rebels of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) on Saturday asked UN military observers to dismantle a reception centre for combatants in Magburaka area in northern Sierra Leone.

"They said their leader had not told them that a centre was to be erected in that area," a UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) official told IRIN on Wednesday. "They did not refuse that the reception centre be put up in this area, but only wanted to get it from their leader first," he explained.

Reception centres are where the peacekeepers make the "first contact" with the combatants, the source explained. "It is where they [combatants] report to the UN military observers, are registered, and have their weapons taken," he said. "Later they are relocated to the disarmament camps for the demobilisation and reintegration programme."

"Up to now, the Magburaka reception centre has not been reopened," the UNAMSIL official said, adding that he expected the matter to be resolved. He said the military observers complied with the rebels' request because "the UN is trying to handle the whole operation as diplomatically as
possible".

So far, the active disarmament centres in Sierra Leone are two in Port Loko in the north, and one each in Lungi (close to Freetown), Bo in the south and Kenema and Daru in the east. UNAMSIL is yet to set up others in Kailahun in the east, Makeni in the north and Moyamba in the south, in addition to Magburaka.

Disarmament is a central element of the July 1999 Lome Peace Agreement signed by the government and all parties to the conflict. Article XVI of the Agreement calls for the encampment, disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration of ex-combatants, whose number is estimated at about 33,000 to 40,000.