More West Side Boys disarm

In the last 10 days, some 82 members of the West Side Boys militia have reported to the disarmament camp at Lungi, north of Freetown, the UN Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL)’s spokesperson, Hirut Befecadu, reported. “We are very happy with the fact that more and more of the West Side Boys and the RUF are coming in to the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration process,” the UN reported Befecadu as saying on Monday. The West Side Boys, a militia made up of ex-Sierra Leone Army soldiers and others, have slowly started disarming since an “intensive operation” by UN peacekeepers on 22 July. ‘Operation Thunderbolt’, whose aim was to clear illegal checkpoints from the roads between Freetown and Lungi, involved “robust” patrols by Indian, Jordanian and Nigerian peacekeepers supported by helicopter gunships. The militia had refused an earlier government order to give themselves up or face punishment. Others who have recently disarmed at Lungi include 53 former members of the Sierra Leone Army and two child soldiers, Befecadu said. The centre at Lungi now houses some 313 ex-fighters and their families, including some who have been there since before hostilities between the Revolutionary United Front and the government resumed in early May.