Sierra Leone, 2002

Two years ago I

came to the rostrum of this Assembly with mixed

feelings. On the one hand, my country had just

witnessed an unprovoked attempt to derail the peace

process. The United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone

(UNAMSIL) was still recovering from a brazen affront

to its military capability and the authority of the

Security Council. On the other hand, I was optimistic,

first of all because the people of Sierra Leone had once

again demonstrated their resolve to maintain their

struggle for peace. I was also optimistic because the

Security Council had responded appropriately by

giving UNAMSIL additional responsibilities within its

mandate, and by increasing the troop level of the

mission.

Today, I stand here with only one feeling, an

overwhelming feeling of joy. At long last the rebel war

in Sierra Leone is over. All combatants have been

disarmed and demobilized. Reintegration is well under

way. Over 55,000 ex-combatants are currently engaged

in reintegration programme activities, ranging from

formal education and vocational-skills training to

small-scale trade, agriculture and community

development. While the National Commission on

Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration is

concentrating on the integration of ex-combatants,

another national agency, the National Commission for

Social Action, is actively engaged in programmes that

will benefit all categories of victims of the brutal war,

particularly the most vulnerable population groups.

Most heartening of the recent positive

developments was the affirmation four months ago by

the people of Sierra Leone that they would never forgo

their constitutional right to choose their leaders freely

through the ballot box. They sent a resounding message

to the entire world that, in Africa, it is still possible to

hold free and fair elections.

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Our objective was not merely to win the rebel

war, but to defend the right of our people to live. We

fought against a brutal attempt by a few who, with the

assistance of forces within and outside the subregion,

were determined to assume power and gain unimpeded

and perpetual access to our mineral resources. My

primary objective as the democratically elected leader

was for us to win the peace. Today, I am pleased to say

here that the people of Sierra Leone are continuing to

work assiduously to win the peace.

We share the view that there cannot be real peace

in Sierra Leone without justice. The support that we

have so far received for the establishment of a special

court to bring to justice those who bear the greatest

responsibility for serious breaches of international

humanitarian law and the national laws of Sierra Leone

should also be regarded as part of the peace dividend.

We are also convinced that we cannot speak about

lasting peace in Sierra Leone without national

reconciliation. Making the Truth and Reconciliation

Commission fully operational after its inauguration in

July 2002 has now become one of our major

preoccupations. Let me add, however, that inadequate

international support for the Commission could

jeopardize prospects for national reconciliation which,

members will agree with me, is one of the prerequisites

of lasting peace and justice.

The victory that the people of Sierra Leone have

so far achieved in the peace process is theirs, but not

theirs alone. It is also a victory for the United Nations,

the Economic Community of West African States

(ECOWAS) and the entire international community.

Indeed, it is a victory for humanity, for all those who

cherish the dignity and worth of the human person.

Therefore, let me take this opportunity, on behalf of

every Sierra Leonean, to express our profound and

sincere gratitude to the United Nations family,

ECOWAS and its Monitoring Group, and other regional

intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations

for their support in our prolonged struggle. This was a

partnership for peace and security that we will never

forget.

With your permission, Sir, I am obliged once

again to single out for commendation some special

friendly States that played a crucial role in that effort. I

refer to the United Kingdom, the Federal Republic of

Nigeria, the Republics of Guinea, Ghana and Mali, and

the United States of America and China, among others.

We will always remember their place in the great

partnership for peace and security that wrenched Sierra

Leone from the verge of total destruction. This is what

collective responsibility is all about in our

interdependent world.

While we celebrate our mutual success, we

should at the same time be aware of the challenges that

we face not only in Sierra Leone, but also in the Mano

River Union and the West African subregions. Our

success notwithstanding, the situation in our part of the

continent continues to pose a threat to international

peace and security. That threat will remain and could

increase if we fail to consolidate the gains that we have

made in Sierra Leone. I should therefore like to

reiterate my recent appeal to the United Nations and

the international community as a whole to remain

engaged in our national effort to consolidate our hard-

won peace. I was encouraged that, following the May

2002 elections, the Secretary-General and the President

of the Security Council underscored the need to further

consolidate what we have achieved so far.

The people of Sierra Leone and the international

community have made considerable investment in

material and human resources to bring us to the stage at

which we find ourselves today. It would be a terrible

mistake if, by sheer complacency and a failure to adopt

the appropriate course of action, we should allow the

country to slip back into armed conflict. We share the

view of the Secretary-General, expressed in his latest

report on UNAMSIL, that the Organization should

ensure that the next phase of the Mission does not

jeopardize the progress achieved so far in stabilizing

peace in Sierra Leone.

Beyond Sierra Leone, there are ominous signs of

spillover conflicts hovering around the subregion. It

would also be tragic if we should underestimate the

current threat to peace and go on procrastinating about

ways of preventing a spillover.

How then do we go about ensuring, at least in the

short run, that Sierra Leone will sustain its newly-won

peace? How do we contain the current hostilities across

the border with Liberia? The need to address these

questions has become more urgent as we approach the

end of the current mandate of UNAMSIL. While

looking forward to the new phase of that important

instrument of peace, I thought that I should draw the

attention of the Security Council, through the

Secretary-General, to some of the issues that could be

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taken into consideration and linked to an exit strategy

for UNAMSIL.

Recently, I shared my thoughts on this and related

matters in a letter which I addressed to the Secretary-

General. The letter has since been circulated as

Security Council document S/2002/975 of 29 August

2002. Permit me to highlight some of the issues raised

in that communication. These are issues related to the

capacity of the Sierra Leone Armed Forces and the

Sierra Leone police to perform their respective

functions more effectively throughout the country; the

challenges facing us in the integration of all ex-

combatants; the risks following from the turbulent

situation in neighbouring Liberia, and particularly its

repercussions for peace and stability in Sierra Leone

and the Mano River Union as a whole; the danger of

the apparent absence of a strategic plan of the

international community to address the situation in

Liberia, especially as the country approaches crucial

elections next year; and finally, the delay in responding

to the request for international assistance to ECOWAS

in ensuring security on the borders shared by Guinea,

Liberia and Sierra Leone.

We are pleased that the Secretary-General has

taken these and other issues into account in preparing

his recommendations to the Security Council for a

measured and phased downsizing of UNAMSIL. This

will ensure that we do not provoke any new sense of

insecurity in a population that has been traumatized for

too long. I am also confident that the Security Council

will consider the recommendations carefully, especially

in the light of my Government's and the Secretary-

General's own assessment that the conflict in Liberia

still constitutes the most serious threat to the stability

that now prevails in Sierra Leone. Who will forget that

the 10-year rebel war in Sierra Leone was launched

from the territory of Liberia?

The current state of peace and security in Sierra

Leone and the rest of the Mano River Union subregion

is obviously a matter of constant concern to us.

However, as a member of the global community, we are

also seriously concerned about impediments to

international cooperation for economic and social

development; about threats to international peace and

security, including the nuclear arms race and terrorism

in all its forms and manifestations; and about the rights

of such vulnerable population groups as children and

people with disabilities. All those often require

appropriate multilateral agreements or arrangements to

ensure that they are effectively addressed.

Never since the end of the Second World War has

multilateral cooperation become such a necessary

means for resolving international disputes and for

ensuring the well-being of people everywhere. Sierra

Leone, therefore, attaches the utmost importance to the

strengthening of multilateral cooperation, as reflected

by such recent conferences as the International

Conference on Financing for Development and the

World Summit on Sustainable Development. Those

provide effective platforms for articulating the interests

of all States and for devising common strategies to

address collectively problems that would otherwise

overwhelm the capacities of individual countries or

regions.

It is, therefore, self-evident that we must continue

to pursue the multilateral approach to those and other

international issues. The consequences of diminishing

or bypassing the multilateral approach in matters that

affect the lives of millions of people worldwide could,

I should emphasize, be disastrous for us all.

Two years ago, in the Millennium Declaration,

heads of State and Government, in the spirit of

interdependence, made a commitment to work together

in achieving specific goals in areas such as peace,

security and disarmament, human rights, good

governance and poverty eradication. Those goals are

all underpinned by a strong belief in the principles of

multilateral cooperation and shared interests.

Of special significance to us are the commitments

made by the world leaders in the Millennium

Declaration to meet the special needs of Africa. That is

not only because Africa has the largest number of

countries classified as least developed, and in which

almost half the population lives in abject poverty. It is

also because we have all benefited and stand to benefit

from each other's resources.

In spite of its current level of overall

development, Africa has a lot to offer to the rest of the

world. Of course, we Africans realize our

responsibility, first and foremost, to develop and

implement strategies for improving the quality of life

of our people and for strengthening our capacity to

contribute more effectively to the economies of our

partners in the developed world.

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In effect, that is what the New Partnership for

Africa's Development (NEPAD) is all about —

partnership among African countries, partnership with

the rest of the world and progress for all mankind. It is

in that context that the conclusions reached at the high-

level meeting of the Assembly earlier this week on

ways and means of supporting NEPAD assume

supreme importance for my country.

In a similar vein, Sierra Leone also welcomes the

commitment of the eight major industrialized countries,

the G-8, at their recent meeting in Canada, to provide

strong support to NEPAD and to establish enhanced

partnerships with African countries whose performance

reflects the NEPAD commitments. Sierra Leone, for its

part, is determined to pursue vigorously the objectives

set out in NEPAD, not just because we need donor

assistance at this time, but more so because we believe

in the soundness of those objectives as a vehicle for the

eradication of extreme poverty, the achievement of

sustainable development and the assumption of greater

responsibility for our own destiny.

I began by assuring the Assembly that I came this

time with one overwhelming feeling, a feeling of joy

over recent developments in my country. Of course, the

search for sustainable peace with justice and national

reconciliation is a continuous process, and we are well

aware of the challenges that we still have to face.

However, I can say with confidence that what we have

so far achieved, with the support of the United Nations

and the international community, has provided the

momentum for us to meet those challenges.