Liberia Destroys Remaining Wartime Weapons

October 19, 1999
Peter Kahler, PANA Correspondent

MONROVIA, Liberia (PANA) - Liberia has finally bid
farewell to war with the
ceremonial destruction of a consignment of arms
marking the end of a
three-month exercise to rid the country of weapons of
destruction.
The exercise was concluded Monday when a
representative of the UN, ECOWAS
(Economic Community of West African States) and
Liberian foreign minister
each detonated by remote control pits filled with
explosives surrendered by
half-a-dozen warring factions in Liberia's
seven-year-old civil war.
The war ended in 1997 with the holding of national
elections in which
Charles Taylor, who ignited the war that claimed a
quarter of a million
lives, won a majority vote.
The special representative of the UN secretary general
to Liberia, Felix
Downes-Thomas, said the exercise closes the final
chapter of an era that
brought death and destruction and untold suffering to
many Liberians.
He described the exercise as the largest single public
display of
conventional weapons ever to be destroyed in peace
time.
Downes-Thomas said more than 19,000 small and heavy
machine guns and over
three million rounds of ammunition were destroyed at a
cost of more than
250,000 UN dollars to the UN.
The weapons included field artillery, mortars, guns
and anti-tank rocket
launchers, the bulk of which were voluntarily
surrendered by combatants
while the rest were collected by ECOMOG during cordon
and search operations.
Liberian foreign minister Monie Captan said the
government's decision to
destroy the weapons further demonstrates its total
commitment and sacred
pledge to fulfil a national duty to restore total
peace and security in the
country.
He said Taylor has declared the destruction site in
Tumbmanburg, a mining
town 60 km north of Monrovia, as a memorial peace park
to commemorate all
those who lost their lives in the civil war.
Captan added that with the destruction of the weapons,
Liberia must now move
ahead in confronting the challenges of national
reconciliation,
re-integration and development which must by promptly
addressed to establish
permanent peace.
Government's special concern is the status and plight
of the child soldiers
and their role in the rebuilding of new nation that
manifests paramount
interest in their welfare.
A representative of ECOMOG, Maj. M. Hussien, said as a
similar exercise of
disarmament is about to kick off in Sierra Leone, he
was enlisting the
co-operation of Liberia in policing its common border
with Sierra Leone for
the success of the exercise.
"As we (ECOMOG) pull out in a few days, we can only
wish the political
leadership and people of Liberia well in the onerous
task of national
reconstruction and development," he added.
______________________________________________________

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International Coordinating Secretariat
P.O.Box 8582
Madison, WI 53708-8582
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"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." -- Einstein
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