Church leaders urge the world to heed their plight - CWS

Liberian church leaders are pleading for urgent world attention for the worsening military and humanitarian crisis in their country, where intensive fighting has been displacing tens of thousands of civilians, Church World Service (CWS) reported on Tuesday. "The world must not watch the death of the rest of us," a CWS news release quoted Rev. Kortu K. Brown as saying. He and other church leaders called for an immediate scheduling of negotiations for a ceasefire and an end to all hostilities, followed by a political process leading to lasting peace. "The crisis right now is very serious and is challenging our limits," said Rev. Brown, who directs Concerned Christian Community, a Liberian faith-based humanitarian organization. "We need [...] immediate food aid - rice, salt, oil, etc. to avert any starvation that may result from thousands of people running from fighting." CWS reported Benjamin Dorme Lartey, general secretary of the Liberian Council of Churches as saying: "The situation is deplorable and pathetic, and there is urgent need to respond to the people, particularly the women and children, and the elderly.” Civil war broke out in Liberia in December 1989 and officially ended in 1997.However, fighting broke out again in 1999 between government forces and Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD), displacing hundreds of thousands of people. Since mid-March 2003, a series of attacks on IDP camps near the Liberian capital, Monrovia, has driven thousands into the city to seek refuge. CWS airlifts supplies CWS, a global humanitarian agency, said it was airlifting 1,500 blankets, 1,000 health kits and 4,296 cans of processed beef to Liberia to arrive on 17 April for prompt distribution. The cost of the goods, shipping and inland transport was paid by five CWS member denominations, the release said. It said the goods would help Concerned Christian Community meet the immediate needs of 2,500 new arrivals at the Perry Town Camp near Monrovia, which gives priority to pregnant women, nursing mothers, the ill and the elderly. They will be provided with temporary shelter in 10 transit facilities and with food, blankets, cooking utensils and counselling services for a three-month period, CWS said. Church World Service anticipates making a second airlift in late April or early May, along with a further contribution for shelter costs, said Donna J. Derr, CWS Associate Director for Emergency Response. CWS is seeking to raise a total of $150,000 to support the airlifts and three more projects, including a joint nutritional, health care and educational project run by the Liberian Council of Churches and the United Methodist Church for 3,000 displaced families in central Liberia’s Bong County. The funds also will support two special outreach programmes - a Concerned Christian Community programme assisting 750 women refugees and returnees who were victims of rape and other abuse, and a YMCA leadership training programme for 1,600 displaced children and youth, who are the most vulnerable to sexual exploitation and military recruitment. Greater international engagement needed CWS said it was responding to the Liberian crisis with advocacy for peace in addition to material aid. It said peace talks originally scheduled for 10 April in Bamako, Mali, but later postponed, should be held soon, with the full participation of all parties. It also called for greater engagement of the US government, and for it to take a direct role of intervention in the Liberian crisis and support for international participation in the elections, according to the release. It also urged support for humanitarian appeals to set up new IDP camps in other locations in Liberia. [More information is available on CWS' website www.churchworldservice.org]