U.N. Reports Killing 10 Rebels in Sierra Leone

The United Nations said Saturday that its troops had killed at least 10 Sierra Leonean rebels in a gunfight a day after an ambush in which a Jordanian peacekeeper was killed.

The attack suggested that the U.N. force, which has been reinforced since it was almost overrun by rebels in May, has opted for a more robust response to any breach of the 1999 peace deal the troops were sent to police.

Hirut Befecadu, spokeswoman for the UNAMSIL, the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Sierra Leone, said U.N. troops had opened fire on a house from which the ambush was staged on the main road from Freetown to the town of Mile 91, 90 miles east of the capital.

“Ten bodies were found in a house that was hit by the UNAMSIL soldiers. . . . There could be others,” Befecadu said. “That [the house] is where the first firing came from.”

One Jordanian peacekeeper was killed and four were wounded when rebels ambushed six UNAMSIL vehicles carrying Jordanian troops on their way to meet a logistics convoy.

Four Nigerians serving with UNAMSIL have been killed and eight U.N. troops are missing in action, Befecadu said. The Jordanians were to escort the logistics convoy between Mile 91 and Masiaka, on the main road to Freetown. The wounded were flown Friday to a Freetown hospital, Befecadu said.