SIERRA LEONE

Forgotten Children of War: Sierra Leonean Refugee Children in Guinea
Sierra Leonean refugee children in Guinea are among the most vulnerable children in  the world. They have lived through an extremely brutal war-most have witnessed or  suffered unspeakable atrocities including widespread killing, mutilation, and sexual  abuse. The human rights abuses that drove these children into flight are only the first  chapter of hardship for many Sierra Leoneans affected by the crisis. Even after  traveling across an international border to seek refuge in Guinea, they remain  vulnerable to hazardous labor exploitation, physical abuse, denial of education, sexual  violence and exploitation, cross-border attacks, militarization of refugee camps, and  recruitment as child soldiers. Human Rights Watch visited Guinea in February and  March 1999. In the refugee camps, they interviewed dozens of refugee teachers,  social workers, and other community leaders as well as forty-nine refugee children:  thirty-three girls and sixteen boys ranging in age from six to seventeen. This report  relates the testimony of these children, whose names have been changed to protect  their privacy.    (A1105), 7/99, 55 pp., $7.00
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 Sierra Leone: Getting Away with Murder, Mutilation, and Rape
This sixty-page report documents how, as rebels took control of the city in January  1999, they made little distinction between civilian and military targets. Testimonies  from victims and survivors describe numerous massacres of civilians gathered in  houses, churches and mosques. One massacre in a mosque on January 22 resulted in  the deaths of sixty-six people. A woman describes how she escaped from a burning  house after rebels set her mother and daughter on  fire. A child recounts how, from  her hiding place, she watched rebels execute seventeen of  her family and friends. The  report also includes testimonies from girls and women who describe how they were  systematically rounded up by the rebels, brought to rebel command centers and then  subjected to individual and gang-rape. Young girls under seventeen, and particularly  those deemed to be virgins, were specifically targeted, and hundreds of them were  later abducted by the rebels. Human Rights Watch documents how entire families  were gunned down in the street, children and adults had their limbs hacked off with  machetes, and girls and young women were taken to rebel bases and sexually  abused.
(A1103), 6/99, 56pp., $7.00
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