LURD rebels commit terrible abuses - Human Rights Watch

Liberian rebels physically, sexually and psychologically abused five nurses whom they held for three months in 2002, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported on Thursday. The nurses, staff members of the non-governmental organization Merci, were given a "choice" between joining the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) as fighters or becoming "wives" of rebel soldiers, HRW said. "All of them were physically, sexually and psychologically abused," HRW said. "Refugees in Sierra Leone who fled Liberia in July-October 2002 also provided eyewitness accounts that LURD systematically imposed forced labor on threat of wounding or death. They told of abductions, "disappearances" and forced recruitment by LURD rebels in Lofa County." "The treatment of these women is just one example of the terrible abuses being committed by LURD," Peter Takirambudde, executive director of HRW said. "Such crimes must stop." HRW said it had also documented massive rights violations by armed forces loyal to President Charles Taylor. The abuses, it said, included summary executions, indiscriminate killing of civilians, intentional targeting of civilian areas, widespread rape and other kinds of sexual violence including sexual slavery, abductions of adults and minors, illegal detention, torture, forced recruitment and forced labour. "Survivors reported civilians being locked into houses and burned alive," HRW said. It added that government troops routinely targeted fleeing civilians, and abducted boys for forced conscription and girls to serve as "wives". The rights watchdog said members of government and rebel forces continue to operate with total impunity, devastating the civilian population and challenging the fragile peace in Liberia’s neighbours — Côte d’Ivoire, Sierra Leone and Guinea. "These ongoing violations threaten not only those who remain in Liberia, but also those refugees who had previously fled to Côte d’Ivoire," HRW said. "The Liberian government and, to a lesser but still significant extent, the LURD forces, continued to systematically violate their obligations under international law. Both have been repeatedly called upon to protect civilians and cease violations of human rights and humanitarian law, and both have consistently failed to do so". Accounts by victims and witnesses collected by HRW