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Sierra Leone: The Killing House of Kailahun
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19 November 2002
Posted to the web 19 November 2002
Ben Phillips
London
Earlier this year in Sierra Leone, photojournalist Ben Phillips came across a building which had all too obviously been the site of gross violence and cruelty during the years of civil war. It had clearly been in use at least until the ceasefire in January 2002. Whether or not it had been used since was impossible to tell - no-one in the community would talk about it. It stood simply as a decaying monument to the pain and suffering of a war without rules and a time of social and moral collapse.
I was travelling in August with one other journalist in the Kailahun district of Sierra Leone. I had just spent the day with the Sierra Leone Army (SLA), who were patrolling villages at the Liberian border. On returning to the district capital in the late afternoon, we were taken to a rebel killing house.
Situated on the outskirts of town, close to the SLA barracks, the concrete, empty shell stood neglected and surrounded by undergrowth.
Pushing through the foliage we came to a door, climbed some steps and entered the first of four rooms. We moved slowly from room to room in silence. Rainwater from the recent storm dripped from the cracked ceilings above us on to our heads and shoulders.
Three of the rooms were identical - dried blood on every surface. The walls were over ten feet high, yet there was spattered blood right up to the ceilings of almost every one.
The fourth room only differed in that it had no windows. No natural light had entered it for a considerable time, and the smell inside was testament to that.
It took me some time, however, before I became aware of the most disturbing aspect of what had occurred in the house - there was no evidence of a single bullet having been fired. It appears no guns were used in the human maiming and killing that went on here.
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Kailahun was a rebel stronghold during Sierra Leone's bloody twelve-year civil war. Our SLA hosts told us that the house had been used by the rebel forces for punishment beatings, court martials and executions. Local people however were reluctant to talk about the house and its history because of its rebel links, and the now reinforced presence of the SLA in the area only compounded their reluctance. It had clearly been abandoned for some time, but no-one was prepared to tell me when the beatings and executions had finally stopped.
Regardless of whether the building had last been used two months or two years ago, the atmosphere within would have been exactly the same. The sheer quantity of blood on every wall revealed the scale of the atrocities that must have taken place in those four rooms. I believe it is fair to say this building witnessed the true horror of Sierra Leone's civil war.
I was surprised it had not been pulled down or at least heavily barricaded to prevent children from exploring; but then again, for Sierra Leone's government forces, what better exhibit to show Western journalists than a disused, but intact, rebel killing house?
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