Currently, there are 168 UN Volunteers in Sierra Leone working within more than 60 functional categories and under 18 different divisions. Among others, they work as water and sewage specialists, field engineers, construction site supervisors, warehouse managers, inventory managers, supply assistants, air traffic controllers, nurses, civil affair officers and human rights specialists. UNAMSIL's vehicle fleet is kept on the road by 16 UNV vehicle mechanics. Reliable and secure communication networks are maintained by a team of UN Volunteers who ensure that all possible forms of communication -- from basic radio communication to advanced communication via satellite -- are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Twenty international UN Volunteers are also active in the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of Sierra Leone's ex-combatants.

A team of 10 national UN Volunteers will join the existing 20 UN Volunteers under a new pilot project starting in March 2003 between UNV and UNAMSIL. The project will promote reconciliation and reintegration in the communities of Sierra Leone that are most devastated by the civil conflict through activities that combine the transition to peace-building with reintegration. The activities will engage voluntary youth groups and demobilized soldiers to rebuild their communities by providing an enabling environment for reintegration and socio-economic recovery. Working with UNAMSIL field offices, the volunteers and local partners will help strengthen youth organizations active in peace and confidence-building; initiate and empower through the mobilization of volunteers a nucleus of community confidence-builders through training in conflict transformation, mediation and facilitation; through social animation programmes, facilitate the peace and reintegration process; and facilitate opportunities for community reintegration, rehabilitation and recovery through voluntary action. The two-year project will take place in nine sites throughout the country.

Besides providing logistical and administrative support to the Mission and substantive support to the Government in re-establishing state authority in all parts of the country, the volunteers have formed a UNV Action Team to help on their own time various causes and work on community-based projects. Last year, for instance, the volunteers finished a well at a children's home and school outside of Freetown, which now provides clean drinking water to some 70 children affected by polio and an estimated 500 to 700 people living in the area. The UNV Action Team is also involved in the distribution of used clothes donated by the Asia and Africa Association and the Government of Japan. These clothes are being delivered to villages, members of civil society and social service organizations - for example, women's groups and orphanages -- in Sierra Leone's poorest and most remote areas.

UN Volunteers' contribution to Sierra Leone
Outside of UNAMSIL, there are approximately 20 UN Volunteers active with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees (UNHCR), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the World Food Programme (WFP), the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the UN Dispensary, and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). Most of them are working with UNHCR, where they work as field officers, protection officers, public health specialists, community service officers, communication officers and agricultural and environmental rehabilitation officers. With WFP, they work as food aid monitors and logistics officers, while UNFPA has a UN Volunteer obstetrician and gynaecologist working to reduce infant mortality. The UN Dispensary in the country is also headed by a UN Volunteer medical doctor. Furthermore, UNV is supporting UNICEF by providing a nutritionist to assist in its efforts in the country, while FAO has a UN Volunteer agro-economist. Finally, a handful of UN Volunteers support the UNDP office in emergency institutional analysis in governance, external relations and resource mobilization and finance.