UN to send relief aid overland to Voinjama

The United Nations said on Monday it would send aid by road to Voinjama, a rebel-held town 307 km northwest of the capital, Monrovia,where several thousand people are reported to be roaming the bush searching for food. Omar Khatib, the head of the UN World Health Organization in Liberia, made the announcement after leading an exploratory mission to Voinjama near the border with Guinea, on Saturday. He told IRIN that local residents had told the team that 15,000 desperate people were roaming the nearby bush searching for food,. But he said the UN team had not seen evidence of malnutrition in the local population and had reckoned there were only 2,000-3,000 needy people in Voinjama itself. "The UN has agreed to carry out a security assessment from Monrovia to Voinjama by road as soon as possible, so that we can go and carry out immunization and food distribution for vulnerable people there," Khatib said. Voinjama is the headquarters of Liberia's main rebel group, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD). The town had not been visited by relief workers since LURD overran it from neighbouring Guinea in 1999. Khatib said Saturday's assessment mission found that sexually transmitted diseases, such as pelvic infections, were rife in Voinjama, the headquarters town of Lofa Country which was once served as Liberia's food basket. They also noted a lack of clean drinking water. "While we were in Voinjama, we fond out that there is only one clinic run by LURD. It has registered nurses and midwives who are not properly trained", he said. The UN had donated two emergency health kits to the clinic to help it treat 20,000 people per month, he added. Khatib however added: "We did not see any case of malnutrition, even though local health workers at the LURD clinic claimed that there are forty cases of malnutrition per week reported to the clinic." Apart from Voinjama, the UN intends to also assess other major towns in Lofa County such as Kolahun, Zorzor and Foya Kamala. Saturday's exploratory mission was the latest of several conducted by the UN in the interior of Liberia since the government and two rebel movements signed a peace accord on 18 August. The launch of full-scale relief operations throughout the country depends on the deployment of 15,000 UN peacekeeping troops in the country. So far, only 4,500 have arrived and these are concentrated in and around Monrovia.