Security Council plans to extend sanctions for 12 months

The UN Security Council has announced plans to extend sanctions on Liberia for a further 12 months and impose a new ban on timber exports, Council president Munir Akram of Pakistan said. The recommendation to maintain and toughen UN sanctions came after the West African country had failed to fully comply with Council demands and had continued to violate the UN arms embargo, he said. The UN said in a separate statement that a panel of experts had found that Chinese timber companies were involved with the Liberian government and armed rebels in violating the arms embargo through a network of Serbian arms dealers, using fake documents. Some of the companies delivered weapons to neighbouring countries, it added. Council members, reviewing the sanctions ahead of a formal decision on their renewal on Tuesday, expressed strong concern over the deteriorating security and humanitarian situation in Liberia and its effects on the sub-region. Akram said in a statement that violence had escalated and now affected every Liberian. The UN estimates that more than 200,000 people have been internally displaced by fighting between the government and two rebel movements that has now reached the outskirts of the capital Monrovia. The sanctions committee of the Security Council members recommended the extension of the two-year-old sanctions against Liberia on Monday after discussing a report on the country, submitted by the Secretary General on 22 April. It also considered a report by a four-member panel of experts set up in February to review sanctions against Liberia that were first imposed in 2001. The panel of experts called for unconditional ceasefire talks between the Liberian government and all armed rebel groups. It also called for free access to be given to humanitarian agencies. Marc Destinne de Bernis, the UN humanitarian coordinator in Liberia, said last week that because of the civil war relief agencies were unable to operate in over 70% of the country. The sanctions already in place include a ban on illicit diamond sales by Liberia and an arms embargo. The also include a travel ban on key government officials in view of Liberia's alleged support to Sierra Leonean rebels. The sanctions review panel was chaired by Senegalese aviation expert Atabou Bobian. It also included Swiss finance expert Enrico Carish, Interpol official Damien Callamand of France from Interpol and British diamond expert Alex Vines. It reported that West Africa was awash with weapons and concluded that in the light of other conflicts in the region sanctions against Liberia alone were not sufficient. "The basis for the imposition of the sanctions against Liberia needs to be reassessed because violence and conflict are spreading across the region and are generated not only by Liberian forces," it said. "A comprehensive new approach by the Council to the situation in all of West Africa is required.". Cote d'Ivoire was plunged into civil war last year and Sierra Leone is emerging from a decade of internal conflict with the help of a 15,000-strong UN peace-keeping force. Human Rights Watch (HRW), urged the Security Council to maintain its arms embargo against Liberia. The organisation said it had documented numerous abuses against civilians by both the government and rebel groups. These included summary executions, child recruitment, sexual violence, looting of civilian property, and forced labour. Liberian and Sierra Leonean combatants were also implicated in serious abuses in western Cote d'Ivoire. The World Food Programme (WFP) meanwhile called on the Liberian government to provide security guarantees before it resumed food distribution to refugees and displaced people in camps near Monrovia. Justin Bagirishya, WFP Liberia country director, said on Monday that food distribution and attacks by armed men on the camps were linked. "Following a violent assault on a camp, refugees would be forced to flee, abandoning recently-distributed food, which would then be seized by armed combatants," he said in a statement. "Earlier this year, Jah Tondo, Ricks and Wilson Corner camps came under assault before or during food distribution." The Secretary General's and expert panel's reports are available as documents S/2003/466 and S/2003/498 at: www.un.org