Fighting ended here in 2002 and elections that year led to a U.N.-guarded peace, but the roots of conflict that have sparked wars in many parts of the region, including corruption and poverty, remain firmly planted in Sierra Leone.

The U.N. peacekeeping force, which was authorized by the Security Council in late 1999, stumbled at first. Through a series of errors, hundreds of peacekeepers were kidnapped in 2000 and the rebels then used U.N. weapons and uniforms to fight.

West African and British intervention forces helped impose an end to fighting, which U.N. troops - numbering 17,500 at the deployment's height - have largely kept a lid on. Aside from a small detachment staying to guard the war crimes tribunal, the peacekeepers are going home.

Mwakawago, the U.N. envoy, called the mission an "outstanding success."

The diamond fields of the east, where shirtless workers sift and dig in mud pits, are now yielding tens of millions of dollars annually to state coffers, not rebel forces. But over half the mining is still illegal.

In a country with 70 percent unemployment, and where many people live on less than $1 a day, rising prices for fuel oil, gas and the staple food, rice, are causing concern that desperate people might again take up weapons to obtain basic needs.