ARC Country Director Returns to Freetown

American Refugee Committee
Thursday, 15 June 2000

The American Refugee Committee's country director for Sierra Leone, Martha Saldinger, has returned to Freetown to continue setting up a program to help victims of the country's brutal civil war.

ARC evacuated Saldinger to Conakry, Guinea, last month after the security situation in Sierra Leone deteriorated in the wake of clashes between rebel forces and United Nations peacekeepers. Conditions are now relatively stable in the areas where ARC plans to operate in the near future -- Freetown, Kenema and Pujehun.

Saldinger is working to establish a program to offer services to refugees returning from Guinea and Liberia, as well as internally displaced people, in areas including microcredit (small loans), reproductive health, and vocational training and counseling for ex-combatants.

The American Refugee Committee is an international nonprofit, nonsectarian organization providing multisectoral humanitarian assistance and training to displaced people in Africa, Asia and Europe.

For more information, or to contact American Refugee Committee, see their website at: www.archq.org