UNAMSIL launches TRC web page

Sierra Leone Web, a US-based news service provider, has agreed to host a web site for the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) to make first-hand information on a Truth and Reconciliation Commission for Sierra Leone accessible from anywhere in the world, UNAMSIL reported on Tuesday. “We commend the support and collaboration of Sierra Leone Web in reinforcing our efforts to reach Sierra Leoneans living abroad and all those interested in Sierra Leone,” Behrooz Sadry, the Acting Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Sierra Leone, said in Freetown. “Sierra Leone Web was launched in February 1996 to be an independent, objective and comprehensive source of news on Sierra Leone at a time when news of the country was all but impossible to obtain outside of its borders,” Peter Andersen, the creator and owner, told IRIN. Behrooz said efforts to popularise the commission were crucial to the peace process, UNAMSIL reported. UNAMSIL’s role, he said, was to help the government and the civil society inform the public about the commission’s provisions and mode of operation. UNAMSIL launched its sensitisation drive about the proposed commission in May, when it opened its first regional human rights office in the eastern town of Kenema. Since then, UNAMSIL’s Human Rights Section, headed by Rodolfo Mattarollo, has organised several sensitisation workshops across the country. UNAMSIL reported that these workshops have involved ex-fighters, traditional leaders, women’s organisations, and law enforcement agents. Material for the sensitisation programme is produced by UNAMSIL, the National Commission on Democracy and human rights groups operating under the umbrella of the National Forum for Human Rights. They produce leaflets, booklets, T-shirts and caps with inscriptions in English and Krio - one of the local languages - as support materials for the programme. The TRC web site can be accessed at: www.sierra-leone.org/trc.html