§ Mr. WorthingtonTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the number of refugees from Sierra leone now in Guinea; and what assistance is being given by the international community to deal with their humanitarian needs and with the causes of their flight from Sierra Leone.
§ Mr. BaldryThe United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates the total number of refugees who have fled since January 1995 at 45,000, bringing the total to 206,000 Sierra Leonean refugees in Guinea since the outbreak of the civil war in 1991. UNHCR is dispatching food, blankets, shelter materials and a water engineer to the region and a World Food Programme chartered vessel is discharging 3,000 tonnes of rice in Conakry both for Liberian and for Sierra Leonean refugees. The United Nations department of humanitarian affairs is currently preparing a regional consolidated inter-agency appeal to cover humanitarian needs.
The United Nations, the Commonwealth. the Organisation of African Unity and others are engaged in bringing about a peaceful solution to the conflict.