UNMIL orders armed factions to remove roadblocks in the interior

The UN peacekeeping force in Liberia said on Wednesday it was increasing its patrols in the interior and had ordered the country's three armed factions to remove all their remaining roadblocks. Major General Joseph Owonibi, the deputy force commander, said these informal roadblocks, manned by fighters loyal to former president Charles Taylor and the LURD and MODEL rebel movements, would no longer be tolerated. "As far as we know, those illegal checkpoints established by the fighters are not meant to provide security. Their main purpose is to extort and harass civilians and this can not be allowed any longer", he told a news conference in the capital Monrovia. "We have sent very strong instructions to all our sector commanders to deal with such situations up country," the soft-spoken Nigerian general said." We are also trying to guarantee security in areas outside of our deployment sites by increasing our patrols," he added. The United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) currently has just over 10,000 men on the ground. The peacekeeping force expects to reach its full strength of 15,000 men by late February or early March. Last week, village representatives from from Rivercess and Grand Kru counties in central and southeastern Liberia came to Monrovia to protest to the transitional government about continued looting and harassment by fighters of the Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL). "Most of the times the fighters set up checkpoints around afternoon and evening hours along the road leading to the towns and villages and ask civilians to take stand on line and demand money before anyone passes through a checkpoint," David Tukpa, a village elder from River Cess county told IRIN. Onwobi said the imminent arrival of additional battalions from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Ethiopia would enable UNMIL to extend its deployment shortly into new areas such as Rivercess county in central Liberia and Lofa in the northwest. Since late December, UNMIL troops have been stationed in two strongholds of the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) rebel movement; Tubmanburg, 60 km northwest of Monrovia, and Gbarnga, 150 km to the northeast. They have also established a presence in the port city of Buchanan, 120 km southeast of the capital, and the strategic towns of Zwedru and Tapeta near the eastern border with Cote d'Ivoire. All three were formerly controlled by MODEL. Owonibi disclosed on Wednesday that a forward company of over 100 peacekeepers had also been deployed in Ganta, a town in Nimba county on the road to Tapeta and Zwedru. Ganta, once bustling market town close to the border with Guinea, had previously been occupied by fighters loyal to Taylor's former government. Taylor stepped down and went into exile in August, paving the way for a peace agreement to end 14 years of near constant civil war in this shattered country of three million people.