MATTHEW TOSTEVIN, Freetown | Sunday 9.00pm.
THE United Nations said on Sunday that another 30 of its Sierra Leone peacekeepers had been released by their rebel captors and were now in Monrovia, the capital of Liberia.
UN spokesman David Wimhurst said in Freetown the UN was hopeful that more would be freed soon.
According to the UN, the number of peacekeepers it now considers as detained is 59. In addition, 23 Indian peacekeepers are surrounded at the eastern town of Kuiva but retain their weapons.
”We expect and hope that more will be released shortly and that those at Kuiva will be allowed to move freely,” Wimhurst said.
The rebel Revolutionary United Front (RUF) took hostage more than 500 peacekeepers when a 1999 peace accord designed to end eight years of civil war in Sierra Leone foundered early this month.
Liberian President Charles Taylor, considered a backer of the RUF in the past, has been leading the diplomatic effort to get them released. Freed peacekeepers have been taken to the border with Liberia and airlifted from there to Monrovia before flying to the Sierra Leone capital, Freetown. — Reuters