The Sierra Leone rebel leader, Foday Sankoh, whose men are holding hostage some 350 UN peacekeepers in the West African country, was being held in protective custody by British troops yesterday after his capture late on Tuesday.
The rebels freed 80 morfe Un hostages yesterday, leaving about 270 peacekeepers and military observers still in captivity. As diplomatic efforts to free the peacekeepers continued, British paratroops were in action for the first time, killing several rebels in a clash near Freetown's international airport, and UN and Sierra Leone troops clashed with rebels in a separate incident further north.
Sankoh, whom the UN Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, holds personally responsible for the breakdown of the 1999 Lome agreement that ended Sierra Leone's eight-year civil war, was flown by helicopter to the airport after being seized, stripped naked and handed over by Sierra Leone officials.
Sankoh, whose whereabouts had been unknown for the past 10 days, leading to rumours that he was dead, was initially taken to a barracks in Freetown but was whisked away after it was surrounded by a mob of thousands baying for his blood.
"This man has caused a lot of trouble. He is a demon who does not deserve to live," said an onlooker. "We should kill that man today."
A soldier at the British-held airport said four rebels were killed and a civilian woman was wounded when rebels, believed to be from Sankoh's Revolutionary United Front (RUF), attacked a paratroop position about 10 miles east of the airport.
A UN spokesman told reporters that a Nigerian peacekeeper and six soldiers of the fledgling Sierra Leone army were killed in another clash with rebels at Port Loko, north of the capital, late on Tuesday. Five UN soldiers and five Sierra Leone soldiers were wounded.
In Moscow, the visiting British Foreign Secretary, Mr Robin Cook, welcomed the arrest of the RUF leader. He hoped it would ease the path of those seeking to establish peace, he told reporters after meeting the Russian Foreign Minister, Mr Igor Ivanov.