17 May: RUF leader Foday Sankoh, who vanished May 8 after
his supporters
opened fire on a crowed of demonstrators in
front of his home, was captured in Freetown
early Wednesday morning. "Just before six
o'clock this morning Foday Sankoh was
detained by a combined team all working
together," a police spokesman said. "The
detention took place in the Spur Road area
of Freetown. Foday Sankoh was saved from
an angry crowd and initially taken to
Cockerell Defence Headquarters for his own safety. He was
later taken to a safe
place. He has a leg injury and we do not know how he
received this. He is
currently in Sierra Leone police custody and is safe. He is
receiving the best
possible medical treatment available for his injury. A
major police inquiry is
continuing and more information will be given at a later
date." BBC correspondent
Lansana Fofana said the rebel leader, who had been searched
for throughout the
capital, had apparently been hiding out in a shack less
than 150 yards from his
residence. Another account, published by the London Press
Association (PA
News), suggested Sankoh had returned to his house
accompanied by one man --
possibly a bodyguard -- after hiding out in the hills. He
was spotted by a man
taking his young nephew to Muslim prayers. Witnesses said
Sankoh asked to be
taken to the Nigerian High Commission. Instead the man
alerted soldiers. "There
was a struggle and, according to some reports, Sankoh drew
a silver revolver but
it was empty," PA News said. "He was quickly overpowered
and shot in the leg
by a soldier known as 'Scorpion'. The man with Sankoh was
also shot and was,
reportedly, close to death." AFRC leader Johnny Paul Koroma
confirmed
Wednesday morning that his men had taken Sankoh into
custody. "He was
arrested somewhere behind his house, just by the hills, and
he was taken to
Lumley Police Station and then finally brought to me," he
told the BBC Network
Africa programme. "It was because my men made the arrest,
and and they did
took him to the police station, and they in turn sent him
to me, and I handed him
over to the government." Koroma said he did not meet with
Sankoh, but instead
attempted to calm the crowd from his veranda. The rebel
leader was paraded
naked through the streets of Freetown by Sierra Leone Army
troops before being
being taken to Defence Headquarters at Cockerill. From
there, according to
Lieutenant-Commander Tony Cramp, spokesman for the British
forces in Sierra
Leone, Sankoh was flown in a British helicopter to a
"secure location" at Lungi
International Airport, where he is being held by the Sierra
Leonean authorities in
what Information Minister Dr. Julius Spencer called
"protective custody." BBC
West Africa correspondent Mark Doyle quoted eyewitnesses as
saying Sankoh
was put on a stretcher and taken under heavy guard to a
Royal Air Force
helicopter.
Information Minister Dr. Julius Spencer said early
Wednesday that no decision
had been made on whether to prosecute RUF
leader Foday
Sankoh. "It depends on what he does and his
attitude, that what
will determine what the government does,"
Spencer told the BBC
Network Africa programme. He said the
government was still
committed to the peace agreement signed with
the RUF in
Lomé, Togo last year. "The government wants
peace," Spencer
said. "That has been our position all along. It
is not in the
interest of this country for us to go back to
all-out war. And we
are trying to avoid that as much as possible. The
government will do what is
necessary to ensure that there is peace. If it is
determined that going along with
the Lomé Agreement is absolutely useless, then the
government will take a
position. But as of now the government’s position is that
we still believe that the
Lomé Agreement is viable and we are going to go along with
that as long as
possible."
REACTION to Sankoh's capture: BRITISH FOREIGN SECRETARY
ROBIN
COOK: "I welcome the news today that the rebel leader Foday
Sankoh has been
arrested and is now in detention. This deprives the
rebellion of its leadership and
encourages us in the hope that we may be able to stabilize
Sierra Leone and
stop the rebel advance...I hope it means that it will
deprive them of the reason for
continuing their fight, and encourage them in the view that
we have actually put
the rebel advance into reverse and that we are on our way
to our objective of
stabilising Sierra Leone and putting the peace process back
on track."
REGINALD GOODRIDGE, Spokesman for Liberian President
Charles Taylor:
"There is definitely cause for concern...The fact that
their leader has been
arrested may throw a stumbling block in the way of the
release of further
hostages. Sankoh is a key part of the Lomé accord. It all
depends on how the
Sierra Leone government decides to proceed." UNAMSIL FORCE
COMMANDER
MAJOR-GENERAL VIJAY KUMAR JETLEY: "Now at least they (the
RUF) have
got some sort a leader. Earlier they were doing things in
isolation..."I think the
peacekeepers are already being released in Liberia. The
Liberian president is
working on that already and many are on the border already,
The process has
already started on getting them released." U.S. SECRETARY
OF STATE
MADELEINE ALBRIGHT: "Today we had some good news, that
Foday Sankoh
has in fact been captured." U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN
RICHARD
BOUCHER: "The fact that he was in the peace process was a
decision of the
government and the people of Sierra Leone. And the next
step in either the peace
process or with him personally is up to them as well. I'm
not going to push them
toward one direction or the other." BRITISH DEFENCE
SECRETARY
GEOFFREY HOON: "(Whether to release Sankoh) is a matter for
the government
of Sierra Leone, but clearly we would prefer that should
not happen." UNITED
STATES U.N. AMBASSADOR RICHARD HOLBROOKE: "I think it's a
positive
development that he is located and he's in a position where
he is going to be able
to be dealt with appropriately, and that he will not be
able to continue the
outrageous agreement-breaking ways that he has pursued."
RUSSIAN U.N.
AMBASSADOR SERGEY LAVROV: "I think we'd have to reassess
Lomé given
all the events, the latest developments." BRITISH U.N.
AMBASSADOR SIR
JEREMY GREENSTOCK: "There needs to be, we hope, a
realization by all sides
that we must come back to the Lomé Agreement and to a
political route forward,
and Foday Sankoh's role in that must be judged by the
government of Sierra
Leone and by the U.N." CHINESE U.N. AMBASSADOR WANG
YINGFAN: (On
how Sankoh's arrest will impact the U.N. peacekeeping
mission) "It depends on
how this development is handled by the government of Sierra
Leone." SIERRA
LEONE PRESIDENTIAL SPOKESMAN SEPTIMUS KAIKAI: "A lot of
these
things are being sorted out now. Our main concern now is
that we can...bring
peace to our country." RUF COMMANDER COL. BAO: "We are
totally against it.
We don’t believe the people in the United Nations want
peace in this country.
They should not have allowed our leader to be humiliated by
useless politicians
like Kabbah and others. That is why we are now trying to
put our matter across
ECOWAS, because we know ECOWAS did well by bringing peace
to this
country. It is the United Nations and Britain who have
derailed the whole peace
process." AFRC LEADER AND CCP CHAIRMAN JOHNNY PAUL KOROMA:
"I
think as far as I am concerned I think he should be tried.
And I particularly when
he killed civilians who were demonstrating in front of his
house. I think he has
something to answer."
The RUF has released 80 more U.N. peacekeepers held by the
rebel group for
two weeks, UNAMSIL spokesman David Wimhurst said on
Wednesday. "Eighty
more have come to (the Liberian border town of) Foya,"
Wimhurst said in
Freetown. He said 44 others, part of the 139 who arrived in
Foya on Sunday,
"have arrived from Foya to Monrovia and should return to
Freetown tonight."
Wimhurst said 81 Zambians and 14 Kenyans had already
arrived in Sierra
Leone's capital.
Libya will send helicopters to help with the evacuation of
injured UNAMSIL troops
who have been freed by the RUF and who have arrived in the
Liberian border town
of Foya, Libya's JANA news agency reported on Wednesday.
United Nations peacekeepers and Sierra Leone Army troops
fought a two-hour
battle with RUF fighters at Port Loko late Tuesday into
Wednesday, UNAMSIL
spokesman David Wimhurst told reporters. He said the RUF
forces attacked
pro-government positions armed with mortars, light arms and
rocket-propelled
grenades. Six Sierra Leonean troops and a Nigerian UNAMSIL
soldier were killed
in the attack, and ten others -- five Sierra Leonean
soldiers and five U.N.
peacekeepers -- were wounded. A U.N. spokesman in New York
said the attack
on Port Loko involved about 500 RUF troops. "In the end the
attack, which was a
serious one, was repelled," he said. Wimhurst said Port
Loko was reported calm
Wednesday afternoon.
ECOWAS nation defence ministers and chiefs of staff meeting
Wednesday in
Abuja, Nigeria have agreed to send additional troops to
Sierra Leone under a
changed UNAMSIL command structure, a high-ranking Nigerian
military officer
told the Agency France-Presse (AFP). "There was a general
consensus that the
countries present would contribute more troops," he said.
"It was agreed they
would go in under UNAMSIL, if funding and a changed command
structure are
agreed with the U.N...It was agreed the command structure
must reflect the
country with the preponderance of troops." Nigeria, with
four battalions in Sierra
Leone, is currently the largest contributor of troops to
the UNAMSIL force.
Rev. Jesse Jackson, U.S. President Bill Clinton's Special
Envoy for the
Promotion of Democracy in Africa, was scheduled to leave
Wednesday for Nigeria, which is considering deploying
additional
troops in Sierra Leone. Jackson's mission was delayed by
one
day while he sought to clarify remarks he made to reporters
last
week which upset the Sierra Leone government and infuriated
civil society groups. Jackson suggested that Sankoh needed
to
be coaxed back into the political process, that Sankoh's
voice
"would be a very positive one," and that all parties in
Sierra
Leone had blood on their hands. On Monday Jackson
"clarified" his position to
say that " Foday Sankoh and the RUF alone are responsible
for the current crisis
in Sierra Leone." After Nigeria, Jackson will visit
Liberia, Mali, Guinea, and Sierra
Leone, security conditions permitting, according to State
Department Spokesman
Richard Boucher. Boucher said Jackson's mission would be to
consult with
regional government on how the U.S. could support their
efforts to resolve the
Sierra Leone crisis and to bring about the release of some
350 U.N. personnel
detained by RUF forces. Jackson will be accompanied on his
West African visit
by Ambassador Howard F. Jeter, Deputy Assistance Secretary
of State for
African Affairs, and State Department staff.
British paratroopers clashed with rebels at Lungi Loi early
Wednesday morning,
near Lungi International Airport. Four of the were reported
killed in the exchange
of fire. "We believe a force of 40 rebels came down the
road towards the
Parachute Regiment position," British military spokesman
Lieutenant-Commander Tony Cramp told reporters. "There was
an engagement
lasting approximately ten minutes, after which the rebels
fled." Another British
officer, Captain Cameron Jack of the First Battalion
Parachute Regiment, said
four rebels were killed and a woman civilian wounded in the
shootout. "Twenty-five
pathfinders in the platoon were attacked by 40 RUF at 0045
this morning and
they responded for ten minutes," Jack said.
Human Rights Watch called on the Sierra Leone government
Wednesday to
ensure that RUF leader Foday Sankoh received a fair trial
for what it called "his
crimes." The human rights group said that extensive
evidence had been compiled
on crimes against humanity carried out Sankoh's followers.
"But that evidence
should be carefully compiled and presented in a court of
law. Sankoh should be
informed of the specific charges against him as soon as
possible, according to
fair trial standards," the groups said in a press
statement. The Sierra Leone
government has not yet said whether it would seek to put
the RUF leader on trial,
and said Wednesday that Sankoh is being held in protective
custody. "There is a
good case against (Sankoh), but it must be presented
soberly and carefully,
before impartial judges," Peter Takirambudde, Executive
Director of Human
Rights Watch's Africa Division as quoted as saying.
"Otherwise, the cycle of
violence in Sierra Leone will only continue." Takirambudde
suggested that the
capacity of the Sierra Leonean judiciary was in question
and that the possibility of
an international tribunal should be considered. "At the
core of the crisis in Sierra
Leone is the question of impunity," Takirambudde said in
the statement. "If the
international community can send investigative teams into
Kosovo to document
war crimes, it should be prepared to do the same for Sierra
Leone. The
perpetrators of abuse must be held accountable."
Following the arrest Wednesday of RUF leader Foday Sankoh,
Amnesty
International repeated its call "for all those
responsible of
committing human rights abuses to be brought to
justice." The
human rights group has opposed a blanket amnesty
for war crimes
committed during the country's civil conflict
"because it violated
international law and failed to address the gross
human rights
abuses, including war crimes and crimes against
humanity,
committed during the conflict," Amnesty said in a
statement. The
statement argued that the RUF had failed to live up to the
provisions of the Lomé
Peace Accord. "Neither RUF members nor anyone else should
continue to
benefit from the amnesty in that agreement," Amnesty said.
"The killings,
mutilations, rape and abductions which continued after the
amnesty are, in any
case, not covered by the amnesty and those responsible must
be brought to
justice." Even if the blanket amnesty were not annulled by
the Sierra Leone
government, the statement said, the international community
should move to
bring those responsible for serious violations of human
rights or international
humanitarian law to justice. "Any state may request the
extradition of suspected
perpetrators of human rights abuses for trial in its own
courts," Amnesty said. "If
the Sierra Leone government does not submit the cases of
such suspects to its
own courts, it must nevertheless comply with any
extradition request."
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