Delegation of UN Peacebuilding Commission concluded maiden mission to Sierra Leone

Freetown, Sierra Leone, 25 March 2007 --- A delegation from the newly established United Nations Peacebuilding Commission completed its first-ever mission, a five-day visit to Sierra Leone, as part of reinforced efforts by the world body to prevent countries emerging from civil war and other conflicts from slipping back into bloodshed.
The 12-member delegation, which wound up its visit on 25 March, has held intensive talks with President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah and other senior officials of the small West African country, which after 11 years of civil war has now entered a peace consolidation phase.

“We came here to look on the ground for first-hand information on issues that the Commission is meant to deal with and to identify challenges to the peacebuilding process,” said Ambassador Frank Majoor, Permanent Representative of the Netherlands to the UN, who headed the delegation in his capacity as chair of the Commission’s Country Specific Meetings on Sierra Leone.
After earlier discussions in the Commission, the Government and the UN mission in Sierra Leone jointly conducted an analysis of critical gaps in peacebuilding efforts and drew up a national priority plan that has been endorsed by the stakeholders and includes youth employment and empowerment, democracy and good governance, justice and security as well as public service delivery.
Mr. Majoor said the working visit helped the delegation to determine specific priorities and gaps within these wider priority areas for the Commission to solicit extended support from donor countries.

He emphasized that the Commission is now closer to an integrated framework – a compact between the Government, donors, the UN, the private sector and civil society – to sustain the national and international commitment to support peacebuilding and stability in Sierra Leone over the years to come.

He and other delegation members described the consolidated approach on various tracks to peacebuilding and development, thus maintaining the continuity of already existing mechanisms such as the Poverty Reduction Strategy Project and the Peace Consolidation Strategy.
Earlier this month, Sierra Leone received $35 million from the UN Peacebuilding Fund, established from voluntary contributions to aid countries which have recently emerged from war from slipping back into conflict, with Sierra Leone and another formerly war-torn African country, Burundi, the first nations to be referred to it.

Although the two countries have made much progress in emerging from their devastating civil conflicts, they continue to face great political and economic challenges, the Commission said then.


PBC(Peacebuilding Commission )成立迄今，第一個任務出現了，就是前往獅子山五天，與當地的重要官員進行瞭解當地情形以及設法避免當地再次發生戰爭、衝突。經過開會討論後，當地政府將與聯合國設立於當地的組織一起努力，重建當地的和平。前些日子，獅子山收到聯合國捐贈的三千五百萬美元，並與另一個國家－蒲隆地(位於中非)共同努力，即使都曾遭受過大規模的摧殘，但依然以重建和平時代為共同目標
資料來源：http://www.uniosil.org/