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A senior UN official has welcomed the recent deployment of police to the former rebel stronghold of Makeni in northern Sierra Leone, the UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) said in a news release on Sunday.
Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Governance and Stabilisation, Alan Doss, visited Makeni as a follow-up to the police deployment and to assess progress in the government's efforts to bring back civil administration. "The eyes of the people of Makeni are upon you, and how you treat the people is critical," Doss told the 130 newly deployed officers. He also visited the local district hospital, which has just reopened its surgical block with the assistance of the NGO, Medecins sans Frontieres, UNAMSIL said.
Sierra Leone is beginning to recover from a 10-year civil war between the state and Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels in which thousands died, were maimed or suffered displacement. State authority is gradually being restored to former rebel-held areas as a result of a disarmament process begun in 1999, interrupted by renewed hostilities in 2000 and resumed in May 2001. The resumption followed the signing of a ceasefire accord between the Sierra Leone government and the RUF in November 2000 in Abuja, Nigeria.
The disarmament of all armed factions is scheduled for completion by the end of November.
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