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Security Council to Adopt Resolution on Sierra Leone
The U.N. Security Council is expected to adopt a resolution Friday to renew the mandate of the U.N. peacekeeping mission, known as UNAMSIL, but not to authorize the immediate increase of the U.N. force in the west African country.
The Security Council began a closed-door session Friday to discuss the draft resolution, and it will approve only a one-month renewal of the UNAMSIL mandate, rather than the six-month extension proposed by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, U.N. officials said here.
The UNAMSIL commander told the Security Council on Thursday that he needs many more troops quickly, but the United States remained opposed to an immediate increase in the 13,000-strong force.
Indian Major-General Vijay Jetley said rebels from the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), who took 500 U.N. soldiers hostage in May and kept 233 others surrounded for two and a half months, still pose a serious danger to the U.N. force.
"The situation is very much under control at the moment, but it's tense," he said. He told reporters that he needs many more troops as quickly as possible, but he did not give any specific figure.
In his latest report to the Security Council on Tuesday, Annan recommended a six-month renewal of the UNAMSIL mandate when the current one expires on August 7. He said it would have to be increased beyond its current authorized strength of 13,000 people drawn from more than 30 countries.
The 15-nation Council initially sent 6,000 peacekeepers to Sierra Leone to help implement a cease-fire accord signed in July last year by the government and the rebels who later violated the accord by attacking U.N. soldiers.
The Council raised the ceiling to 13,000 in May after the rebels reignited the civil war. At the time, Annan recommended an addition of 3,500 peacekeepers to help the Sierra Leonean government to regain authority over the rebel-held territory.
But U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Richard Holbrooke said last week that the United States believes that 13,000 troops are sufficient to do the job if they are better equipped and if the mission is restructured to better deal with the hostile situation it is currently confronting. A U.S. official reiterated the position Thursday.
A brutal 8-year civil war, financed by rebel sales of illicit diamonds and marked by widespread atrocities, was supposed to have ended with an accord signed in Lome, capital of Togo, in July 1999 that brought rebel leader Foday Sankoh into the coalition government.
However, fighting broke out again in the war-torn country early this year and more than 500 U.N. soldiers were taken hostage by RUF rebels in May. Sankoh is currently in government custody in Freetown, capital of Sierra Leone.
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