Child soldier recruiter nabbed

2005-04-13 13:47

Monrovia - United Nations forces have arrested a former Liberian rebel leader on suspicion of recruiting child soldiers to fight for the government of neighbouring Ivory Coast against its own rebels, diplomats said.

Named as Adama Keita, he was arrested on Tuesday at Zwedru in southern Liberia as he was about to cross the border with several children in a vehicle registered in Ivory Coast.

One diplomatic source said Keita, a leader of the former Movement for Democracy in Liberia, left the country after a transitional government was installed in Monrovia in October 2003 but had resurfaced some two months ago.

Since then, "he was in and out between the two countries to recruit child soldiers for the Ivorian government," the source said, adding that an Ivorian with him, named as George Tai, managed to escape when Keita was arrested.

The source said Keita had an Ivorian as well as a Liberian passport, but this was denied by Ivory Coast's consul in Monrovia, Prosper Kotchi.

Kotchi confirmed Keita's arrest and said he had been ordered by Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo to clear up the matter, but he denied charges, recently raised by Human Rights Watch, that Gbagbo's government was recruiting child soldiers.

"I can tell you that no Ivorian is recruiting Liberian mercenaries," he said.

Human Rights Watch said on March 31 that the Ivorian government had recruited scores of child soldiers from Liberia to join the fight against rebels holding the north of Ivory Coast.

Citing interviews on both sides of the border, the New York-based rights group said both Ivorian army officers and Liberian ex-commanders had stepped up recruitment efforts during two periods that correspond to strikes against the rebel zone.

Abou Moussa, United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan's special representative in Liberia, told reporters in Monrovia on April 1 that both rebel and government forces in Ivory Coast were recruiting men who fought in Liberia's civil war.

Ivorian military spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Jules Yao Yao rejected the allegations, saying army recruitment comes from the Ivorian population.

The crisis in the world's top cocoa producer began in September 2002 with a failed coup against Gbagbo that erupted into civil war.

The New Forces rebels have accused Gbagbo of trying to scuttle a peace deal forged with South African mediation last week, notably by recruiting mercenaries.

South Africa said on Tuesday it was probing the rebel claims, and would "take some action" if they were substantiated.

The rival sides initially agreed to a ceasefire in the Linas-Marcoussis accords, signed in a town south of Paris in January 2003, and followed up by other pacts, while the truce lines have for years been patrolled by French troops and by west African soldiers now operating under a UN mandate.

- AFP