Supporters of Sierra Leone's President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah claim he hired the British military consultancy firm at the centre of a Customs and Excise investigation into the alleged breach of UN sanctions. They have denied any knowledge of official British involvement in the deal.
As the Prime Minster, Mr Tony Blair, and Downing Street moved decisively yesterday to stand behind the beleaguered Foreign Secretary, Mr Robin Cook, reports emerging from Sierra Leone presented a different picture about official British complicity than first assumed.
A spokesman for British Customs and Excise told The Irish Times it was in no doubt that supplying arms to Mr Kabbah's exiled government did break UN sanctions. The spokesman said there was "no confusion here about that" and any confusion "is at the Foreign Office." Asked if Customs and Excise believed the sanctions had been broken the spokesman replied: "Yes."
Sierra Leone's Information Minister, Mr Julius Spencer, appeared to shed fresh light on the sequence of events which led to alleged UN sanctions-busting by the British company Sandline International. Mr Spencer claimed that after Mr Kabbah was ousted from power in a military coup last May, he approached representatives of Sandline International to supply weapons and ammunition to anti-junta militias to return him to power. "The president entered into an agreement with Sandline and I am not aware he held a discussion with the British government on the matter," Mr Spencer insisted. Mr Spencer claimed that Sandline International did approach Mr Kabbah shortly after he was deposed to supply the arms, but he had not wanted to "involve" the company. However, between May and December 1997 he changed his mind. Mr Spencer said that a $10 million arms shipment arrived from Bulgaria after Nigerian forces had recaptured the capital, Freetown. But rather than helping the pro-Kabbah forces, the arms "didn't make any contribution whatsoever" to liberating the capital from the military junta. As the Tories increased pressure on Mr Cook, Mr Blair took the unusual step of backing the Foreign Secretary, the Foreign Office Minister, Mr Tony Lloyd, and Britain's High Commissioner to Sierra Leone, Mr Peter Penfold.
At the weekend the high commissioner appeared to be the main target of suspicions that British officials were aware of the plan to overthrow the military junta in Sierra Leone and restore Mr Kabbah to power, thus breaching a UN arms embargo. However, Mr Blair's praise of Mr Penfold's "superb job," angered the Tory shadow foreign secretary, Mr Michael Howard, who said his intervention could jeopardise the Customs and Excise investigation. Mr Blair said British officials were "quite right" to work to restore Mr Kabbah to power and he dismissed the whole row as "overblown." And he added: "Don't let us forget what was happening was that the UN and the UK were trying to help the democratic regime restore its position from an illegal military coup." Britain believes the `good guys' won in Sierra Leone, but Mr Blair warned that any minister or official involved in "deliberately breaking" the UN embargo would face disciplinary action. Sensing Mr Cook's vulnerability, Mr Howard demanded answers to his questions. He dismissed the promise of an independent inquiry, insisting there should be a full public inquiry. "He is not answering the questions at the heart of this matter - who knew what and when?"