Chiefdom Shading Key:

	No violations reported (in statements to the TRC)
	Less than 25 violations reported
	25 or more violations reported

Note: Chiefdoms are shaded according to the number of violations recorded in the TRC's statements. Unreported violations may have occurred in chiefdoms where none are shown. Also the reporting of violations within a chiefdom does not imply that the abuse occurred at a particular location within that chiefdom. Outliers are excluded where evidence supports this decision. See the methodology for further explanation.

The RUF assembles

Whilst undertaking guerilla training in Gadaffi's Libya Foday Sankoh became the self-appointed leader of those committed to violent regime change in Sierra Leone. Sankoh also met Charles Taylor at this time. They agreed to help each other in their "revolutionary" endeavours. Having fought with Taylor in his attack on Liberia, Sankoh was then granted space to create his own force. This began in October 1990 in Camp Namma in Liberia, a little to the North of Gbaranga in Bong county.

Listing the names of those gathered at Namma is like a roll-call of the notorious - people who would become known for their brutality. Dennis Mingo - alias Superman - had been fighting with the NPFL. Issa Sesay was a young man who had been getting by as a petty trader in Ivory Coast. Sam Bockarie - alias Mosquito - worked as a hairdresser. All were to become battlefield commanders in the RUF.

Many people joined under duress. Staying at the RUF camp was a better option than the alternative, the risking of summary execution in a Liberian prison. Training was basic, covering fundamentals like how to fire a gun. Many recruits were beaten and these assaults were fatal in some cases.

The period spent recruiting and training the RUF fighters lasted for several months. On the 1st of March 1991 Foday Sankoh gave a 90 day ultimatum to the government of Joseph Momoh to relinquish power or "I will remove him from power". But this threat was overtaken by events on the ground, with the war beginning just a few weeks later.

Now, progress to the beginning of the conflict: "1991 - The War Begins" or see "Paralysis in Freetown" for a quick introduction to the consequences of decades of bad government.

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The recruitment and training of the RUF is covered in more detail in The Military and Political History of the Conflict chapter of the TRC report (from paragraph 50).