Liberia In the Land of Blood and Tears

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In the past few weeks Monrovia had turned relatively quiet, as ECOMOG troops set up checkpoints to keep the Johnson and Taylor factions apart. But death hovers over the city. Virtually no food shipments have arrived since rebel forces first entered Monrovia in July, and hunger is taking lives every day. The starving look as if they are sleeping, curled up on the sidewalks, but their eyes are open; they simply lack the strength to stand. Sam, 8, who approached me with his brother John, 11, pleaded, "Missy, we haven't eaten in three days." I took them to the flat where I was staying and gave them each an orange and some rice. Their parents were missing, probably dead -- and there were thousands like them in Monrovia.

Even if the war were to end tomorrow, recovery would take years. Monrovia's power plant has been severely damaged. The iron-ore mining industry, which earned Liberia more than $200 million a year in peacetime, will never recover; the cost of processing low-quality ore with out-of-date equipment is prohibitive. The rubber industry, Liberia's other main money earner, can be revived, but because of growing competition from Southeast Asia, it will never be as profitable as it was.

The psychological damage to Liberia's population of 2 million cannot be fathomed. What does it do to people to walk along Monrovia's sandy beaches and have to step around skulls and rib cages that are only half submerged in the sand? Taking stock of the toll, a Monrovia cleric said simply, "I weep for this country." If only tears could start the healing.