Trouble in the north interrupts food deliveries

During fighting between rebel factions last week in northern Sierra Leone, ECOMOG could not grant road security clearance for the World Food Programme (WFP) to deliver 60 mt of food from Freetown to Lungi via Rogberi and Port Loko, WFP said in its emergency report last Thursday. It also put on hold a planned needs assessment mission to Kambia District in the north, but as soon as security improves WFP will go ahead with the mission, the report said. The fighting broke out less than a month after RUF leader Foday Sankoh and ex-AFRC head Johnny Paul Koroma promised, on returning to Freetown on 3 October, to work together to implement a peace pact the government and the RUF signed on 7 July in Lome, Togo. Each side has blamed the other for the renewed fighting, Reuters reported.