| Submit your comments on this article |
| Africa: West |
| Sierra Leone Leader Declares Disarmament |
| 2004-02-05 |
| President Ahmed Tejah Kabbah and international sponsors declared a successful end to disarmament in Sierra Leone on Wednesday, closing a final chapter in an 11-year war that was one of the modern world’s most vicious. This is excellent news. Coincidentially, the French had nothing to do with this success. Disarmament took guns out of the hands of 72,490 former fighters in the West African country, including 6,845 children, Kabbah said on state radio. Other African nations already are studying Sierra Leone’s campaign as a model, viewing it as "the best practical example throughout the world of a successful disarmament, demobilization and reintegration program," said Eileen Murray of the World Bank, one of the effort’s funders. Something worked. Kabbah presided over the official closure Tuesday of the National Committee for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration. The office was set up in July 1999, under an earlier peace accord that failed. Kabbah praised the head of the disarmament program, Francis Kai Kai, for a job well done, but said the reintegration of former combatants would remain an ongoing task. About 51,000 of those who handed over their weapons were given vocational training or were placed in agricultural jobs or returned to school. Thousands of others relied on their own means to return to civil society, Kai Kai said. In neighboring countries, U.N.-sponsored disarmament has stalled in Liberia, and disarmament promised under a French-brokered peace deal has yet to begin in Ivory Coast. And there’s the difference. |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #2 Of course, disarmament is an unfortunate word to use in Sierra Leone. |
| Posted by: Eric Jablow 2004-2-5 1:05:50 PM |
| #1 IIUC, the brits were running the show in Sierra Leone, a former Brit colony. apparently with Brits running things, even the World Bank and NGO's can do a worthwhile job. |
| Posted by: liberalhawk 2004-2-5 9:22:41 AM |