Liberian refugees returning from Ghana rescued

UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 9 -- A Dutch U.N. team Friday rescued 265 Liberian refugees, including about 60 children and some pregnant women, stranded four days aboard a disabled ship in the Atlantic.

A U.N. spokesman said Dutch marines from the naval ship the Rotterdam reached the El-Shaddai early Thursday and supplied the refugees on board with badly needed food, water and medical assistance. Assigned to the U.N. Mission in Sierra Leone, the marines were unable to repair the stricken ship and took the refugees onboard the Rotterdam, which is due in the Liberian capital of Monrovia Saturday morning.

The refugees were returning from Ghana to their homes in Liberia, which had been involved in 14 years of civil war, said the spokesman at U.N. headquarters in New York.

The El-Shaddai had been stranded three miles southwest of the Liberian coast, near the border with the Ivory Coast, after its engine failed.

The Dutch team was sent out to help after the Monrovia office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees learned of the situation.