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WHO MOURNS THE VICTIMS OF SIERRA LEONE?

by Vanessa Lofton

In the first days of 1999, men began appearing in east Freetown, Sierra Leone, saying that they were fleeing from the rebels. In fact, they themselves were the rebels, and they began their onslaught on January 6, 1999. The words "January 6" in Freetown are now used to mean "the apocalypse." Whatever happened in 1996 and 1997 pales by comparison. It was one of the most horrific acts of genocide in world history.

Edmond Jah, who works at the Mammy Yoko Hotel where much of the UN staff is quartered, resided in east Freetown, which even before the attack was the slum neighborhood of a poor city. "It was midnight," he says, "and I was suddenly awoken by a shot. I thought it was nothing, but almost immediately the shots were everywhere. I ran outside with my family. The rebels were shooting at anyone, killing babies, women, old men. We ran away and hid in the hills." Edmond crept back into town, and saw things that he could scarcely have imagined. Corpses of murdered and mutilated people were stacked up outside Connaught Hospital.

Genocide or acts of genocide have occurred after the Second World War and the atrocities of Sierra Leone underscore how contemporary they can be. There has been limited national and international media coverage of genocide in Sierra Leone and in countries such as Rwanda, Sudan and Cambodia. In many ways, these contemporary examples of genocide are just as or more horrific than ones in the past. Rape, torture, mutilation , dismemberment of victims and murder are concepts most Americans cannot fully conceptualize. Rebel soldiers, who performed such atrocities on the innocent victims of Sierra Leone, have demonstrated to the world that hate in its most vile form still permeates.

The RUF defends these violations of inhumanity by their own laws of war, which serve to heold some accountability by perpetrators of injustice. Unfortunately, such laws are not respected by rebel soldiers who wage a war against innocent, unarmed citizens. As with most areas of conflict, issues are usually vested in a power struggle for resources or economic gains. Since Sierra Leone's major resources are diamonds and the conflict in Sierra Leone is linked to the control of diamonds and other valuable trade resources, a solution for resolution of this eight-year-old civil war is for all parties (national and international) to first respect the International Humanitarian Law and desist from targeting civilians for attack. As the Human Rights Watch organization has stated, "the RUF must stop and deist indiscriminate killings, rape, mutilation, the abduction of civilians, especially children for use as soldiers, laborers, sexual slaves, or other purposes and other violations of the law of war.

In order to end the cycle of violence, there must be an analysis of the root causes of the conflict and a sincere effort on the part of the government and international community to address them. A national and international peace accord between the present government and the RUF needs to begin now in order to restore peace to this devastated war torn country seared by human misery. Those in political power must develop a process of community peace building. This would be a first step toward restoring social cohesion and hope for a brighter, better future.

One integral aspect that must not go unnoticed is that the government is not without blame during these years of rebel terrorization. History has shown that an oppressed people will, instinctively, rise against their oppressor under certain circumstances. What is taken for granted by the government, media and general public is that the rebels were, prior to joining with Sankoh, Freetown citizens who were downtrodden with poverty in a land flourishing with the most precious and most sought after gemstones in the world. The vast majority of Sierra Leones were abandoned, abused and misused by their government. More importantly, the young rebels were easily misled into their own demise under the guise of a man who, as they, was undereducated and fought with his heart, not mind. In effect, the massacre was two-fold, that of the innocent civilians and that of the rebel soldiers who chose death over a life of misery. If Sierra Leone is to be successful in the rehabilitation of its land, especially Freetown, and restoration of its communities, the leaders and members of RUF must be punished for these heinous crimes.

The people of Sierra Leone must be made to feel respected as humans and not merely commodities. By any means necessary should never apply in Sierra Leone's conflict, and the old adage of an eye for an eye, which seems to be a rule of thumb for both the rebels and government, should never entail harming innocent babies. Are the members of RUF capable of remorse? Will they accept responsibility for their misconduct and the unthinkable injuries afflicted upon the civilians and the country of Sierra Leone? Should the citizens, the present government of Sierra Leone and the international community allow the RUF reintegration into the community? Old ways of thinking and doing business cannot be applied to Sierra Leone and it's rich mineral country. The rebels have shown the world that old ways of thinking and doing business brings about deadly consequences. However, until justice is served in Sierra Leone, there may never be peace.