SIERRA LEONE: Irish judges may be involved in the forthcoming special war crimes court in Sierra Leone, the country's ambassador designate to the State has said.
Mr Alhaji Sulaiman Tejan-Jalloh also said the Government has "given a lot of assistance" to Sierra Leone in the past and will be sending two observers to the country's elections in May.
He told The Irish Times he "would not be surprised if some Irish judges are put in the court", which will try the 30 or 40 people "most responsible" for atrocities committed during the country's ten year civil war.
A "prime candidate" for trial in the special court, which will try people under a hybrid of Sierra Leonean and international law, would be Mr Foday Sankoh, the leader of the rebel RUF force, which carried out some of the worst atrocities in the conflict. The special court will also be accompanied by a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) that aims to promote reconciliation by giving a voice to victims and perpetrators of war crimes. It will probably not result in prosecutions, though since 1999 all former combatants enjoy an amnesty for their actions.
Mr Tejan-Jalloh, who is also the Sierra Leone High Commissioner to the UK, was in the State this week on a two-day visit in which he met with official from the Department of Foreign Affairs, NGOs, missionaries, and Sierra Leonians who live here.
Peace was declared in January this year in the small West African country.
More than 20,000 UN peacekeepers are currently deployed there, but there are fears that instability in neighbouring Liberia could spill over into Sierra Leone, sucking it into conflict again.
Some 50,000 people were killed in the civil war, which forced half the population of nearly five million to flee.
The country is the poorest in the world, according to UN statistics, which ranked Sierra Leone bottom of 162 countries across a range of poverty and development indices.
Mr Tejan-Jalloh said there is a need to "consolidate the peace and meet the development challenges".
He said he would like aid to the country from the State to move beyond "purely humanitarian assistance" to contributions to help develop the country's damaged infrastructure. Many of the country's displaced population are now returning, placing more pressure on the country's infrastructure.