CRS ends food distribution in Lunsar

An emergency food distribution effort by the Catholic Relief Services ended on Thursday in Lunsar, about 71 km northeast of Freetown, marking the first delivery to the area since December 1998. The area has been inaccessible because of fighting between the Revolutionary United Front and pro-government troops. The distribution consisted of at least 150 mt of lentils, bulgur wheat and cooking oil to some 15,000 people in two days, the CRS assistant country representative, Jacques Montouroy, said. Montouroy, who supervised the distribution, said factors that impaired distribution were the poor state of roads and rain swollen rivers. Rebel control of the region has also hindered the ability of local farmers to plant and harvest crops. Trading in seeds and goods has also been severely restricted. ECOMOG, police discuss crime fighting arrangements Senior officials of the ECOWAS Monitoring Group (ECOMOG) and the Sierra Leone police met on Thursday to discuss arrangements to combat a "rising wave of violent crime" in Sierra Leone, ECOMOG announced in a news release faxed to IRIN on Friday. ECOMOG spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Chris Olukolade told IRIN security arrangements had been modified for the Freetown metropolitan area in response to the increase in crime. The number of fixed check points have been reduced and more mobile patrols have been introduced, he said. "Now that we are relaxing security we don't want people to take advantage of this," Olukolade said. He said the relaxation of security was meant to spur socio-economic activity and complement the progress made in the peace effort, so far. At Thursday's meeting, which was also attended by President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, ECOMOG Force Commander Major General Gabriel Kpamber said the peacekeepers' involvement "was necessitated by the urgent need to address the social menace of armed robbery and other violent crimes in recent times". The deputy inspector-general of police, Kande Bangura, said although the police had the necessary manpower for the task, it still needed ECOMOG support to help bring the situation under control as fast as possible. ECOMOG willing to continue helping peace effort At a meeting at the ECOMOG headquarters on Wednesday with officials of the British Defence Ministry and Department for International Development (DFID), Kpamber stressed ECOMOG's readiness to help the United Nations achieve peace in Sierra Leone. ECOMOG reported Kpamber as saying that he believed the United Nations wanted ECOMOG to remain in the country to see the peace process to its logical conclusion. However, he warned against relegating ECOMOG to the background in any arrangement for working out the peace process, saying that this might discourage the African countries which have committed troops and money to the process.