Ex-UN lawyer demands jail for aid worker abusers

Professor Andrew McLeod, lead investigator at Intersec Action and a former United Nations humanitarian lawyer, has called for aid workers and peacekeepers accused of abusing vulnerable women in conflict zones to be jailed.

Speaking in an interview on Global South World Conversation, McLeod alleged that women in refugee camps in Sierra Leone and Liberia were exploited during the conflicts in the early 2000s.

“In countries like Sierra Leone and Liberia, an enormous amount of abuse of women took place by peacekeepers,” he told host, Ismail Akwei.

McLeod claimed some women fleeing violence and seeking refuge were denied access to camps unless they exchanged sexual favours.

“The food for sex scandals we saw in the early 2000s in Liberia and Sierra Leone saw people escaping the horrible wars in that country in the time, going to refugee camps, but not being allowed in unless they handed a child over for sexual favours,” he stated.

The former UN lawyer accused international institutions of failing to adequately address the allegations over the years.

“And this sort of denial, obfuscation and hiding that the United Nations has been doing for years, pretending the abuse is the cost of doing business or it’s being exaggerated,” McLeod said.

He argued that accountability should remain central in addressing abuse linked to humanitarian and peacekeeping missions.

“It’s like, no, this abuse has to stop and the men who are responsible for it need to go to jail,” he added.

McLeod previously worked with the United Nations as a humanitarian lawyer and earlier with the Red Cross. He now leads Intersec Action, an organisation that uses forensic DNA investigations to identify fathers linked to children allegedly abandoned by aid workers, foreign personnel and peacekeepers.

According to McLeod, the organisation works with victims and local lawyers in several countries to establish paternity and pursue legal action against identified fathers.