Some 2,500 refugees cross to Guinea

Some 2,500 people fleeing insecurity in Sierra Leone crossed into Guinea over a four-day period last week, the UNHCR reported on Friday.

Among the latest group were 15 child soldiers and a number of women and young girls, UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said at a news briefing in Geneva. Intensified fighting in Sierra Leone’s diamond area, fear of the government’s bombing of rebel-held positions and harassment of the population by members of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) are among reasons cited for the exodus, he said.

The child fighters had served for periods ranging from one to seven years with the rebels or, as in one case, with the Sierra Leone Army, the UNHCR reported. All said they had been drugged with cocaine and had been very brutal and aggressive. They said they had been captured by armed rebels and forced to fight. Many young girls and women have said they were held by RUF forces, some for several years, who made them work as domestics or guards, or sexually abused them. They are now separated from the rest of the camp’s population and are receiving medical and psychological attention, Redmond said.

The rate of arrivals in Guinea has been intensifying since the last week of July, UNHCR said. Between May and July there were only 600 arrivals, but in the last two weeks, more than 4,000 have arrived and are being accommodated in Mangay Camp, Guekedou district, near the border with Sierra Leone and Liberia.