The US military sent 41 Marines to reinforce security at the American Embassy in Liberia’s war-shattered capital, frustrating Liberians who want US forces to play a broader role enforcing peace.
The contingent, from the Fleet Anti-terrorism Security Team, departed from Rota, Spain, Major Bill Bigelow, a spokesperson at European Command in Stuttgart, Germany, said on Monday.
The US embassy in the Liberian capital Monrovia was hit on Monday by a mortar shell, without causing any casualties.One mortar struck outside a nearby hotel where a young boy lay dead, face-down in the grass.
Over a dozen shells fell earlier near the compound, landing in the Atlantic Ocean just outside the embassy, which is located in the war-wracked capital’s diplomatic quarter, Mamba Point.
The shelling interrupted the deployment of the US special forces.
Residents used a mat as a stretcher to carry a man bleeding from the leg to a clinic run by an aid group down the street.
Mortar fire also fell in other parts of the city. One shell landed in a single house in a heavily populated neighborhood, killing 18 people inside. The bodies were being pulled out of the house and laid out in the street.
Mortars also landed near the John F Kennedy Hospital, the city’s main hospital. Medical staff frantically moved people from an outdoor triage center indoors.
An American journalist suffered sharpnel wounds in the arm during the fighting. Ealier on Monday, residents emerged after another night hunkered down in basements and diplomatic compounds and listened on hand-held radios to news of the US Marines deployment.
Moses Smith (32) voiced frustration: ”The coming of additional American troops is important,” Smith said. ”But what we need is not those just coming to mind American property, but those who will be deployed on the ground to give us the feeling that peace is really coming.”
Liberians are weary after 14 years of bloody turmoil. Many say they won’t be satisfied that stability is possible until US peacekeepers land in the country, founded more than a century ago by freed American slaves.
US Navy Lieutenant Commander Terrence Dudley, a spokesperson for a US military assessment team in Liberia to assess conditions ahead of a possible US peacekeeping force, countered that an increased security presence at the embassy was a sign of commitment.
”The message is clear that Americans are beefing up security in Liberia so we can remain in these hostile conditions. That in itself is an indication of the commitment that the United States is showing to the people of Liberia,” he said.
But with promised peacekeepers yet to arrive, warlord-turned-President Charles Taylor has vowed to fight to the last man in Monrovia — his only remaining stronghold in the country founded more than 150 years ago by freed American slaves.
Taylor has pledged to resign and accept an offer of asylum in Nigeria — but only after peacekeepers arrive to ensure an orderly transition. Meantime, US President George Bush is considering sending US troops, although he has set Taylor’s departure as a condition.
Bush has promised assistance to West African nations planning to send more than 1 500 soldiers to enforce the often-violated June 17 ceasefire. Sporadic gunfire spooked residents in the beleaguered capital on Monday.
On Monday fighting was concentrated in the city’s port area where there was heavy exchange of gunfire near and on the bridges leading downtown from the port area.
One bridge was littered with bullet casings as government fighters tried to cross to Bushrod Island, which is controlled by rebels.
”The [rebels] will not withdraw voluntarily. We will need to put real firepower behind them before they can leave the port,” said Armed Forces Major General Roland Duo.
Officials, however, for the rebel movement Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (Lurd) said they had told their fighters to halt their positions.
”We told them to stop where they are, but it all depends on whether Taylor’s forces keep firing on them,” Charles Benny, a Lurd leader attending peace talks said.
There was also heavy looting by government fighters in eastern neighbourhoods on Monday according to Defence Minister Daniel Chea who said he was working to stop it.
Rebels pounded the city with mortars on Sunday and pushed deeper into the northern suburbs before being repelled by government forces into the port area. The fighting sent a new wave of terrified residents fleeing with bundles of possessions balanced on their heads. The casualty toll was not clear, but hundreds were killed when rebels fighting to oust Taylor last penetrated the city in June.
Government fighters were gleeful on Monday that they rebuffed rebel
forces into the port area, saying they would continue to fight.
In Washington, the US State Department called for an immediate ceasefire by all parties and a focus on continuing peace talks in Ghana aimed at setting up a unity government to oversee fresh elections.
”Liberia’s path to peace is through the multiparty peace talks,” State Department deputy spokesperson Philip Reeker said on Sunday.
”We also ask the leaders of west Africa to use their influence and leverage to prevent further violence, by controlling their borders and not allowing the flow of weapons into Liberia.”
General Abdulsalami Abubakar, the former Nigerian military ruler mediating peace negotiations in Ghana, also appealed for an end to the fighting. Aid groups and hospitals say they have treated some 300 wounded, both civilian and soldiers.
Also on Monday, heavy looting was reported downtown and in some eastern neighbourhoods, including at a hospital where communications equipment and vehicles were stolen.
Taylor launched Liberian’s last civil war in 1989, emerging in 1996 as the country’s strongest warlord. He was elected president the following year, and now faces rebels who include former rivals from the earlier war.
A United Nations-backed tribunal has indicted him on war crimes for supporting Sierra Leone’s notoriously brutal rebels. – Sapa-AP, Sapa-AFP