Joint Verification Team to leave for Liberia on Saturday

The ECOWAS-led Joint Verification Team (JVT) would leave Accra on Saturday for Liberia to verify the pre-ceasefire locations of the combat units of the three belligerent groups in the bloody civil war.

This would enable the team to monitor any breach of the ceasefire agreement that came into effect on Wednesday.

The six-page agreement made it mandatory for the signatories - the Liberian government, Liberians United For Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) and the Movement For Democracy in Liberia (MODEL) - to identify the locations of their units including combat equipment and communicate this information to the JVT in writing within 72 hours that expires on Friday.

ECOWAS Spokesperson for the peace talks, Mr Sonny Ugoh said in an interview with the Ghana News Agency on Friday that the JVT would spend one week in Liberia visiting the locations provided by the factions and plot unit locations on a map.

"This document shall be signed by all the parties and would be the reference document on the limits of their locations."

Mr Ugoh said the ECOWAS team on the JVT would also do reconnaissance for the logistics requirements of the International Stabilisation Force to be sent to the war-torn country.

The JVT would submit a report to the Defence and Security Committee of ECOWAS that would sit in Abuja, Nigeria on June 28 to make further recommendations for the Stabilisation Force.

He said the JVT was awaiting two representatives each from the warring factions from Liberia to embark on the verification trip.

The ceasefire agreement provides for a Joint Monitoring Committee (JMC) that would report daily to the ECOWAS Headquarters on claims of violations of the ceasefire for investigations.

The JMC would compose of the warring parties, UN, African Union and the International Contact Group on Liberia.

Meanwhile two consultative meetings are going on at the M-Plaza Hotel with the warring factions in one group and the 18 political parties and other civil society groups in another discussing the 10 points outlined by the ceasefire agreement.

These include commencement of disarmament, demobilisation and re-integration of combatants, restructuring of the security forces and human rights and reconciliation.

The consultative session would also consider humanitarian issues, socio-economic reforms, reconstruction and rehabilitation of Liberia, creation of a transitional government, the role of President Charles Taylor in post-conflict Liberia and general election.

The various groups are discussing the composition of the stabilisation force; who leads it, countries to be part of it and the composition of the transitional government, among other things.

Mr Charles Branskine, Presidential hopeful of the Liberia Unification Party, who is on the Security Committee, told the GNA that so far talks on disarmament and demobilization of combatants had gone on very well.

The draft agenda for the Political Committee for Friday include the Constitution, fundamental freedoms; establishment of an independent human rights commission, electoral reform/review, institutional support and economic governance.

The belligerent forces - Government and two rebel groups - on Tuesday signed a ceasefire agreement to end the 12-year-old civil war that has displaced over 500,000 people and led to major humanitarian crisis.