Further enquiries into Freetown fracas

Investigations into the circumstances in which two people reportedly died from bullet wounds and three others were injured in the Sierra Leonean capital, Freetown, in July are still ongoing, an official of the UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL), Behrooz Sadry, said on Friday.

UNAMSIL had received a report of the 18 July incident by the nongovernmental organisation Human Rights Committee on Thursday, which "gave some information that had not been available to UNAMSIL," the official said.

Violence and looting erupted in Freetown after a Sierra Leonean black-market trader, Momodu Jam Bah, was found dead, allegedly murdered by Nigerian criminals, news organisations reported. Sierra Leonean youths went on the rampage and looted Nigerian-owned businesses in Freetown.

Sierra Leone's consortium of nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) issued a report on Thursday, saying that UN peacekeepers who had gone to restore calm used "disproportionate force" in quelling the skirmishes, according to news reports.

The online Sierra Leone Web quoted the report as saying that eyewitness accounts and medical evidence suggested the victims had been hit by direct bullets.

"We have every intention of pursing that information with them, as well as with those mentioned in their report as eye-witnesses," said Sadry.

"If any of that information proves to be of value, we will then
transform our fact-finding into an investigation," the Deputy Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Operations and Management explained.

"I'm not in a position to say UNAMSIL is guilty or not guilty," Sadry added. "We are still continuing with our investigations. As soon as we have something definitive, we'll issue another report on it."

According to UNAMSIL, its earlier fact-finding committee had come up with "insufficient factual information" on the incident.