Robbers attack bus passengers

Some 30 armed men robbed a passenger bus in Kambia District on Friday before being driven back under fire from ECOMOG troops, the spokesman for the West African peacekeeping force, Lieutenant Colonel Chris Olukolade, told IRIN on Monday. “It was just fortunate that our troops were on patrol in the area at the time, they returned fire on the attackers who then escaped into the bush with their loot,” Olukolade said. “It was probably carried out by ex-Sierra Leone army forces, judging from descriptions given to me by witnesses,” he said. The bus was on its way to Pamalap just across the Guinean border when it was ambushed near the Mange bridge, some 60 km north of Freetown. Seven unhurt passengers were brought back to Freetown by ECOMOG. The exact number of passengers is unknown, Olukolade said, and some may have continued to their destinations because there had been no confirmed reports of any abductions.