Isichei Osamgbi And Abayomi Oni
11 June 2003
Lagos — Many Liberians have begun to flee fighting areas in the country in droves, as the sound of gunfire reverberated through Liberia's capital Monrovia yesterday, ahead of a last-ditch mission by West African mediators to try to avert a bloody showdown for the city.
As dwindling food supplies were handed out to residents, the country's Health Minister, Peter Coleman appealed to the international community for emergency aid to stem a humanitarian crisis.
Monrovia has come under fierce attack by the main rebel faction LURD for four days, raising fears of a repeat of the tribal fighting which left the city's streets littered with bodies in the 1990s.
The rebels, under a crescendo of international pressure to stop their advance, said they had given orders to their fighters to hold their positions. But after a few hours of silence, the sound of heavy arms resounded again from north western suburbs.
With peace talks in Ghana adjourned until today, regional mediators set off on a diplomatic shuttle. Diplomats said they were due to fly into Liberia to meet President Charles Taylor at around midday yesterday.
Pressure on the Liberian leader, a former warlord elected president in 1997 after a seven-year civil war which cost 200,000 lives, rose further last week as he was indicted for war crimes in nearby Sierra Leone by a United Nations (UN) -backed court.
Throwing its weight behind regional efforts to prevent a bloodbath, the United Nations Security Council called on the warring sides Monday "to immediately cease all hostilities and to give the current peace process a chance to succeed."
French troops evacuated more than 500 foreigners, including U.S. and European citizens, Monday. But with land escape routes cut off by fighting, ordinary Liberians have little choice other than seeking shelter in the city itself.
Monrovia's population has already been swelled by tens of thousands terrified refugees, many of whom are now huddling at the main soccer stadium with little food or drinking water.
"This is a serious humanitarian crisis unfolding," said Coleman as armed soldiers oversaw the distribution of rice to thousands of displaced people.
"That's why we're appealing to the international community to send supplies. We can hold on for a few more days but things are deteriorating." LURD's forces reached the port, some three miles from the city centre, before they were halted Monday.
Together with another rebel group, known as Model, they control two thirds of the country of three million people. The rebels had on Sunday given Taylor 72 hours to step down.
Taylor has few friends within the international community. He has been accused of spreading conflicts across West Africa, notably in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast.
But regional and Western diplomats say it is imperative to avoid a three-way struggle for Monrovia by undisciplined forces split along ethnic lines and hungry for power and plunder.
The head of the UN refugee agency, Ruud Lubbers, has urged the UN to send a peacekeeping force to Liberia. He said the international community could not escape its responsibility to help bring about a ceasefire.
The capital was reported to be comparatively calm despite some firing early yesterday, after days of intense fighting as rebels seek to topple Taylor.
Aid officials said that in the face of the rebel advance, more than 60,000 refugees had headed into Monrovia from camps where they fled from fighting in other parts of the country during the three years of war between the government and rebels of Lurd - Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy.
In a BBC interview, the head of the UN refugee agency, Ruud Lubbers, said the situation was dire because of the numbers of displaced people.
"It is pretty clear that there is an urgent need for an international peacekeeping force, because I think it's too optimistic to ask for a ceasefire that holds if there is not a peacekeeping force on the ground. " He added that the international community could not escape its responsibility to help achieve a ceasefire.
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