Annual West African truce week established

The Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, Olara Otunnu, aims to take new West African initatives, especially a week of truce for war-affected children, and make them into a worldwide campaign, he told journalists in New York on Thursday. Ministers of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) agreed last month to establish an annual “West African Week of Truce,” for children affected by war, Otunnu said. Fighting would stop during such periods to allow access for vaccination and registration of children, he said, adding that Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea-Bissau were particularly important in that context. In the region’s non-conflict areas, activities would be organised to focus on the needs and rights of war-affected children and to mobilise support for them. Ministers had also agreed to create an office devoted to the protection of war-affected children within the ECOWAS secretariat in Abuja, the Nigerian capital. These and other initiatives are contained in the Accra Declaration on War-Affected Children in West Africa resulting from an ECOWAS meeting held in Ghana from 27 to 28 April.