conflict changed dramatically in terms of the treatment of civilians as the Krahn-Gio feud fuelled an ethnic conflict between the Gueré and Yacouba in the west. Recruitment of government-backed Liberian rebel fighters The government also relied on Liberians to shore up its efforts, and recruited two pools of Liberian combatants. Firstly, it appears that in December the government recruited hundreds of Liberian Krahn fighters from the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) faction, who were reportedly preparing an Ivorianbased front for their war against Taylor even prior to the onset of the Ivorian conflict in September 2002.105 As infighting increased within the LURD, these Krahn fighters coalesced in a new splinter Liberian faction called the Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL), whose links with the Ivorian government has been documented in several recent reports.106 The second group of Liberian fighters recruited by the Ivorian government were refugees, mainly recruited from Nicla refugee camp near Guiglo, but also from refugee transit centers in Abidjan. Reports of refugee recruitment later emerged from as far afield as Ghana.107 Some of the Liberian recruits fighting with both the Ivorian government and rebel forces included former child soldiers108 and other veterans of the first brutal Liberian war and the war in Sierra Leone. Human rights groups have documented an atrocious catalogue of abuses against civilians committed by the Liberian government and rebel groups not only in the first war in the 1990s, but also more recently in Monrovia and in Lofa, Liberia’s northern county.109 The recruitment of Liberian mercenaries, including child soldiers, from groups with a wellestablished history of serious violations, was grossly irresponsible on the part on the part of the Ivorian government and an invitation to further atrocities, this time against Ivorian civilians and immigrants. The first reports of the government using Liberian fighters dates to the counterattack on Blolékin in the second week of December 2002, after MPIGO’s advances in the west. Formalization of contacts between the Ivorian government and key Krahn members of LURD apparently took place in Abidjan in late-December 2002 and early January 2003.110 The precise terms and brokers of the deal struck between the Ivorian government and members of the Liberian rebel group remain unclear. However, it is certain that many were recruited with the promise of salaries and arms and an agreement that once successful in their mission on Ivorian soil, they could retain their weapons and return to Liberia. For instance, in February 2003, “child soldiers [were] told that if they liberate the area around Bin Houyé, then they will be allowed to keep their guns and return to Liberia to fight Taylor.”111 Despite government denials, there were key Ivorian individuals, including some members of the government armed forces, who acted as nominal commanders of the Liberian contingent, and intermediaries brought supplies of petrol and bottled water from Guiglo and Duékoué to positions in the west such as Péhé and Toulepleu. Tensions rose when the recruits did not receive their promised payment from the government. Human Rights Watch was informed that some of the Liberians who were recruited with the lure of salaries turned to looting and Taylor’s forces have persecuted the Krahn and Mandingo. See also Stephen Ellis, The Mask of Anarchy, (Hurst & Company: London,) 1999, pp. 52-74. 105 Document on file with Human Rights Watch, May 30, 2003. 106 International Crisis Group, “Tackling Liberia: the Eye of the Regional Storm,” April 30, 2003, pp.20-24; Report of the U.N. Panel of Experts, S/2003/498. 107A.C. Ohene, “Swoop on Buduburam,” Ghanaian Chronicle, February 24, 2003. http://allafrica.com/stories/200302250402.html. 108 In this report, the word “child” refers to anyone under the age of eighteen. Article 1 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) defines a child as “every human being under the age of eighteen years unless, under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier.” CRC, G.A. Res. 44/25, U.N. doc A/RES/44/25, ratified by Côte Ivoire on February 4, 1991. 109 See, “Back to the Brink: War Crimes by Liberian Government and Rebels,” Human Rights Watch Report, Vol.14, No.4 (A), May 2002, and “Liberian Refugees in Guinea: Refoulement, Militarization of Camps, and Other Protection Concerns,” Human Rights Watch Report, Vol.14, No.8 (A), November 2002. 110 Report of the U.N. Panel of Experts on Liberia, S/2003/498. 111 Human Rights Watch interview, Abidjan, March 26, 2003. Human Rights Watch 32 August 2003, Vol. 15, No. 14 (A)