Freetown - More than 1,700 fighters in Sierra Leone's civil war, including over 200 children, have handed in weapons since rebels and a government militia agreed to disarm last week, the UN said yesterday.
Disarmament began in northern Sierra Leone last Friday after an agreement was drawn up to restore a plan to end more than a decade of war in the West African country.
The UN mission said 813 fighters from the Revolutionary United Front and 915 from the government's Civil Defence Forces had handed over weapons by Monday.