Doumbouya hosts border crisis talks with Guinea's neighbours

Border crisis talks have been taking place in Conkary on Monday between President Mamady Doumbouya and his counterparts from Guinea’s two neighbours Sierra Leone and Liberia.

President Joseph Boakai of Liberia and his Sierra Leonean opposite number Julius Maada Bio met Doumbouya during a high-level mini-summit to resolve the disputes over their shared borders which had sparked tensiøns in recent weeks.

As an observer, Ivorian leader Alassane Ouattara has also been attending the summit which focused on the peaceful resolution of the border disputes in the interest of regional stability.

The three countries together with Cote D’Ivoire form the Mano River Union.

The talks were examining the modalities of a negotiated settlement of the border disputes concerning the convergence zone between the three countries.

According to the Guinean presidency, this high-level meeting is aimed at preventing any escalation and would review the diplomatic and technical mechanisms that could lead to a consensual delimitation of the borders and the peaceful management of this sensitive area.

For context, Guinean troops apprehended 16 Sierra Leonean soldiers near the border in February 22 as they were building a border outpost in the town of Kaliyereh located in Falaba District Sierra Leone. The Guineans claimed the apprehended soldiers had trespassed into Koudaya, 1.4km inside Guinea without prior authoritisation, an allegation the Sierra Leoneans had denied. Following negotiations between officials of the two countries, the apprehended soldiers were freed five days later.On March 2nd a similar incident involving Guinean troops and Liberian civilians took place near in Sorlumba, Lofa County in Liberia, where tension was high as angry crowds briefly clashed with the soldiers who had crossed the Makoni River, bordering the two countries.

Guinea contended that there was a sand extraction operation going on in a contested border area, by a Liberian company contracted for roadworks in Foya.

The equipment used at the site was seized by the Guinean border guards who said it lacked authorisation. The Liberians responded by moving the Liberian flag, initially positioned about 800 meters from the river, closer to the river bank, an action denounced by Conakry as an “illegal occupation” of Guinean territory.

A meeting held in Guéckédou on March 8th de-escalated the tensions, with the Liberian Minister of the Interior, Niuma Ley assuring the other party that the flag would be returned to its original position.

On the eve of Monday’s summit, President Doumbouya demonstrated Guinea’s firm stance on the issue, by personally presenting the national flag to the soldiers of the latest contingent deployed to the border, with the assurances that ”no portion of the land left by our ancestors will be conquered from this evening onward”.

However, Doumbouya emphasised the defensive nature of the latest troop deployment along Guinea’s borders, reiterating that the Guinean military ”would never by be an army of conquest” but one committed to ”fiercely defending” the country’s territorial integrity.

RNK/te/sf/ac/lb/as/APA

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Doumbouya hosts border crisis talks with Guinea’s neighbours

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