Organisation of African Unity Secretary-General Salim Ahmed Salim, who ended on Thursday a four-day fact-finding tour to Sierra Leone, pledged continued support to that country in its search for peace and its effort to alleviate the suffering of its people, the OAU said.
“I would like to emphasise that our essential objective is to support constitutional order and the speedy process of peace and stability,” he added, according to a UNAMSIL press briefing in Freetown on Thursday. In this regard, he said that the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) and other parties trying to unseat the government with arms should realise that a government “has to be elected constitutionally and not by the barrel of the gun”.
Salim said that US $100,000 out of a US $250,000 OAU donation to Sierra Leone was meant for the country's disarmament, demobilisation and rehabilitation programme. An equal amount was reserved for amputees and $50,000 for the Commission for the Consolidation of Peace.
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