From now on, protecting security in Liberia is the responsibility of the country’s own security forces for the first time since civil war ended in the West African country 13 years ago.
The UN’s UNMIL mission that did the job will now play only a small support role, a move welcomed by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
A UN peacekeeping force transferred responsibilities on Thursday, and President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf will mark the handover on Friday.
The UNMIL has worked to rebuild police and military forces from scratch and disarmed rebels. A reduced UN force of about 1 200 troops will remain in a supporting role.
“Everything I know about policing, I learned from UNMIL,” said Dao R. Freeman, Liberia’s national deputy police commissioner, using the UN mission’s acronym.
Freeman, a product of training that has attempted to instill an anti-corruption ethos and respect for human rights, believes the country has “quality not quantity” when it comes to keeping order on the streets.
“If we continue to build that capacity and also provide the resources that are needed, I believe that we can take responsibility of our country’s security,” he told AFP.
Ban paid tribute to Liberia’s determination “to work towards lasting peace,” his spokesman said.
The peacekeeping force was deployed in 2003 to help stabilise Liberia after a four-year civil war. That conflict and a previous civil war are said to have killed more than 250 000.
During the Ebola virus outbreak in 2014, Liberia’s UN ambassador called a strong international presence in the country “a critical stabilising factor.”
