Gun Running

While the U.S. last week loudly protested a wave of atrocities sweeping the war-torn African nation of Sierra Leone, questions arose about whether enough had been done to support the United Nations arms embargo that was imposed last October and that the U.S. backed. Did the State Department ignore a clandestine delivery by a group of British mercenaries of nearly 40 tons of high-powered weapons to the diamond-rich nation? Both British Foreign Secretary ROBIN COOK and State Department spokesman JAMES RUBIN deny knowledge of the shipment. But a well-informed U.S. official tells TIME that word of the February deal was flashed to Washington from Africa and elsewhere. A participant in a Foggy Bottom meeting in early March says the completed shipment was described in detail at that session. But U.S. officials raised no alarm that the U.N. embargo had been violated.

--By Adam Zagorin/Washington