Annan calls for aid to Guinea and Liberia

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan joined West African leaders on Monday in a plea to the international community to help Guinea and Liberia cope with refugees and the growing humanitarian crisis resulting from armed dissident activity along their common border. UN Spokesman Fred Eckhard said Annan had been following, with concern, the mounting tension between the two countries in the wake of attacks on towns and villages that had left many civilians dead. Annan welcomed the declaration adopted last week by the Ad Hoc Committee of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Heads of State and Government, in which the leaders of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone agreed to undertake confidence-building measures to re-establish an environment of peace, security and trust. Annan called on these leaders to abide faithfully by their agreement and was "ready to assist them in any way possible", Eckhard said.