Annan wants UNAMSIL strength hiked to 20,500

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has recommended that the UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) be increased to 20,500 troops to attain greater operational efficiency and deploy in key areas of the country, the UN Department of Information said on Monday. “The presence of a robust and determined peacekeeping force in Sierra Leone should be part of a strategy to induce armed groups to disarm, in combination with strong incentives for their reintegration into Sierra Leone society,” he said. In this regard, he called on the international community and the Sierra Leone government to prepare projects offering combatants the chance of a “new and more constructive life”. Sierra Leone Information Minister Julius Spencer told IRIN on Tuesday his government was “very optimistic” that the Security Council would agree to an increase in the authorised UNAMSIL strength of 13,000. Annan’s report, released on Monday, comes in the wake of the seizure of 11 British soldiers and their Sierra Leonean army liaison officer by ex-Sierra Leonean soldiers calling themselves the West Side Boys. The abducted soldiers had left their Benguema military training base for Masiaka, some 40 km to the northeast, to coordinate security arrangements with Jordanian UN peacekeepers. “The British troops completed their mission in the area on Friday the 25th, and on their way back to Benguema they were stopped and detained,” Sierra Leone Web quoted Gordon Hughes, the brigadier commanding British forces in Sierra Leone, as saying.