Who are Sierra Leone's rebels?

Civilians always pay the price when rebellion erupts

By the BBC's Jim Corrigall

Sierra Leone's Revolutionary United Front rebels launched what they called a mission to liberate their motherland in 1991.

They were given crucial backing by Charles Taylor's rebels in neighbouring Liberia.

The Liberian rebels wanted to destabilise Sierra Leone's government because it was supporting the West African force fighting against them.

UN soldiers - but now the rebels are using their uniform and equipment

Whatever early idealism the Sierra Leonean rebels may have felt soon evaporated in a war characterised by greed and an almost incredible brutality.

Like many of Africa's most intractable conflicts, it is funded by illegal diamond sales.

The rebels control the diamond-rich east, which they have shown no willingness to give up, despite the fact that their leader, Foday Sankoh, has been minister in charge of mining in the present coalition government.

Buying weapons

The recent clashes with the UN began as peacekeepers moved into the east of Sierra Leone to try to disarm the rebels under the peace accord of May last year.

The UN should have been better prepared - the RUF had bought 68 tons of weapons from Bulgaria as recently as last December.

A child mutilated by the rebels

Since the capture last week of 500 UN staff, rebels have taken to wearing their military uniforms and driving around in UN armoured personnel carriers.

In nine years of civil war, 75,000 people have been killed.

The most effective weapon of the Sierra Leone rebels is terror - they specialise in hacking the limbs off their civilian victims, as well as raping and killing.

And they capture young villagers, forcing them to become their shock troops.