UN Team to Investigate Liberia Sanction Violations

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has appointed a team of diamond and timber specialists to investigate the implementation and possible violations of Security Council diamond and timber sanctions against Liberia.

The five-member team, called an expert panel, includes Arthur Blundell of Canada, Senegal's Atabou Bodian (chairman), Damien Callemand (France), Caspar Fithen (United Kingdom) and Tommy Garnett (Sierra Leone). All five served as members of the previous expert monitoring panel on Liberia.

The previous panel acted from the end of last year until the end of its mandate in June. Fithen is the diamond expert of the team while Callemand has an investigative police background.

Last month the expert panel was re-established and tasked by the Security Council to investigate violations of the arms embargo, the travel ban on individuals who pose a threat to the region's security, and the embargo on the export of rough diamonds and round logs and timber products from Liberia.

Liberia recently asked the Council to lift the sanctions on the export of diamonds and timber products, but the measures will continue until at least December 21. The expert panel is mandated to operate until then as well.

The Council imposed the sanctions in 2001 and widened them last year, after the long-running civil war in Liberia ended, in a bid to discourage instability in West Africa.