Sierra Leone frees 171 RUF rebels

FREETOWN, Sierra Leone (Reuters) -- The Sierra Leone government on Friday freed 171 people from prison, most of them fighters of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) whose release was announced by President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah Monday in a peace gesture.

Moses Showers, deputy director of Freetown's main Pademba Road prison, told reporters that 84 people had been freed from his prison and the rest from other prisons around the country, notably Bo and Kenema.

MESSAGE BOARD Crisis in Sierra Leone

He said the bulk of the prisoners released were rebel fighters but there were also some civilians with connections to the RUF. He did not elaborate.

Senior RUF figures, including Alimamy Pallo Bangura and Mike Lamin, remained in prison, he said. They were energy minister and trade minister respectively in the unity government formed after a July 1999 agreement to end Sierra Leone's civil war.

That agreement fell apart in May when RUF fighters captured United Nations peacekeepers and took up arms against Kabbah.

RUF leader Foday Sankoh was arrested in May and faces trial for human rights offences.

The RUF this week chose its field commander, Issa Sesay, to replace Sankoh as leader. The government and mediators saw this as a signal that the RUF wanted to reopen peace talks, and Kabbah responded with a pledge to release 171 RUF ex-combatants.

Despite these moves, fighting continues around the country.

Sierra Leone army spokesman Maj. John Milton told reporters that RUF fighters had attacked government positions in the western Port Loko region Thursday, seriously wounding two army soldiers. Five rebels were killed, he said.

Milton called on Sesay to stop the attacks.

"I personally know General Issa Sesay and I know him as somebody who may be committed to peace. Therefore, I am calling on him to order his men to desist immediately from attacking government troop positions and to stop harassing civilians," Milton said.

Separately, army and intelligence sources said that 27 rebels known as West Side Boys had been executed Wednesday by their commander, named as Brig. Gen. Kallay.

He suspected them of wanting to surrender to United Nations peacekeepers at Masiaka, 47 miles east of Freetown, as 37 of their comrades had done about two weeks ago, they said.

The West Side Boys are ex-soldiers loyal to Sierra Leone's 1997/98 military junta. After first siding with the government against the RUF in May, some of them took to the hills outside Freetown and they have ignored appeals to turn in their weapons.

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