Taylor calls for UN peace-keeping force (corrected)

IRIN's Monrovia story headlined "Liberia: Taylor calls for UN peacekeeping force" erroneously stated in the ninth paragraph that LURD chairman Sekou Conneh would personally attend peace talks in Ghana. The following corrected story makes clear that Conneh in fact promised to visit LURD fighters on the front line in Monrovia to persuade them to respect any ceasefire agreed at the peace talks. MONROVIA, 11 June (IRIN) President Charles Taylor has called for a UN peacekeeping force to be sent to Liberia to maintain a proposed ceasefire between government forces and rebels besieging the capital Monrovia. The information ministry issued a statement on Tuesday night which said: "The government of Liberia is appealing to the UN Secretary General to draft a resolution for the immediate deployment of a UN force in Liberia." The statement, read out on Monrovia radio stations, reiterated Taylor's commitment to participate in stalled peace talks in Ghana with two rebel groups that now occupy more than half the West African country. "The government will be sending a high-powered military delegation to Ghana to negotiate a ceasefire, headed by the Minister of Defence Daniel Chea," the statement said. A diplomatic source in the Ghanaian town of Akosombo, where the talks are due to take place, said international mediators hoped the government and rebels would agree on the terms of a ceasefire by Friday. However, the Liberian government's call for a UN peacekeeping force failed to address key demands by both rebel movements that Taylor step down as president to make way for an interim goverment of national reconciliation which would organised fresh elections. Taylor said at the start of peace talks in Ghana last week that he would be prepared to quit in the name of peace, but he has since stated that he intends to serve out the rest of his current six-year term. According to the constitution, that should end on August 2, but Taylor has stated his intention to organise presidential elections on October 14 and extend his present mandate until January 6 2004. The Liberian government statement was issued after Taylor held two hours of talks with US ambassador John Blaney on Tuesday and ahead of a planned meeting on Wednesday with two West African peace envoys. Mohammed Ibn Chambas, the Executive Secretary of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), and Ghanaian Foreign Minister Nana Akufo-Addo were due to fly in to persuade Taylor to declare a ceasefire and resume peace talks with the rebels. Akufo-Addo told IRIN on Tuesday night during a stopover in the Sierra Leone capital, Freetown, that he and Chambas had received a commitment from Sekou Conneh, the chairman of the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) rebel movement, that he would travel from Guinea to the front line in Monrovia on Wednesday to persuade LURD fighters to respect any ceasefire agreed at the peace talks. "He is still committed to the ceasefire," the Ghanaian foreign minister said. "He is in fact going to the front lines tomorrow...to let the message go out that they would like a peaceful settlement to the conflict and that Akosombo should be given a chance to succeed." A diplomat in the Guinean capital, Conakry, told IRIN that Conneh "gave his word that his troops will call a ceasefire", adding that "it only now remains to be seen whether this will be implemented on the ground. LURD, which occupies much of northern Liberia, has been fighting its way into the western outskirts of Monrovia for the past week, sending more than 100,000 displaced people fleeing for safety to the city centre. The rebel onslaught on the capital also triggered an exodus of diplomats and expatriate aid workers from the city. More than 500 foreign evacuees were due to arrive in Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire, aboard a French warship on Wednesday. The Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL), the other rebel movement, which occupies the southeast of the country, was absent from the start of the peace talks in Ghana on June 4. However, following international pressure, it has now sent a high-level delegation to Ghana which includes its military commander Boi Bleaju Boi. Diplomats say LURD, which has been battling to overthrow Taylor since 1999, is heavily backed by Guinea, whereas MODEL, which only appeared on the scene in March this year, is strongly supported by Cote d'Ivoire. Both countries have turned against Taylor for his alleged role in spreading conflict to other countries in the region. Taylor, himself a former warlord, was indicted for war crimes last week by a UN-backed Special Court in Sierra Leone for his backing of rebel forces in that country's 10-year civil war. The international community has grown increasingly concerned at the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation in Monrovia, a city of around one million people, which has no electricty or piped water and is suffering a food shortage that has sent prices soaring in the few shops still left open. UN relief agencies have warned that "a dire humanitarian situation" is developing in the city, where thousands of displaced people have sought refuge in schools and the national sports stadium. Eyewitnesses said many others were still wandering the rain-drenched streets in search of food and shelter. Relief workers said some cases of measles and cholera have been reported. Fighting appeared to have died down on Wednesday morning after sporadic shooting erupted again in the western suburbs on Tuesday night. The IRIN correspondent in Monrovia counted 113 bodies lying in one street after a battle there at the weekend. Neither the government or LURD have given casualty figures for the fighting, but the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) reported on Tuesday that over 500 people wounded in the street battles had been treated in Monrovia's main John F. Kennedy hospital since rebel forces began pushing into the city on June 5. A team of local staff from UN agencies, the Red Cross and other relief organisations was due to tour Monrovia on Wednesday to take stock of the situation and assess the immediate needs of those displaced by the fighting. In its statement inviting the United Nations to send a peacekeeping force to Liberia, the government "expressed concern about the growing humanitarian situation in Monrovia as a result of the (rebel) attack." Presidential spokesman Vaani Paasawe said in a radio broadcast on Wednesday that the government wanted the peacekeeping force to establish a buffer between government and rebel positions in the capital. It also wanted the proposed force to stop the rebels from attacking the other main towns in Liberia that were still in government hands, he added.