U.S.-Liberia Relationship
U.S.-Liberia Relationship
Fact
Sheet
Office of the Spokesperson
Washington,
DC
February 27, 2015
The U.S.-Liberia relationship dates back nearly 200 years and is stronger than ever as we continue working together to get to zero Ebola cases. Liberia, under the leadership of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, has emerged from over a decade of war to be a key champion of democracy, peace, and development. The U.S. is Liberia’s leading partner, having invested over $1 billion in bilateral assistance since 2003.
Ebola Emergency Response
• As the President announced on February 11,
together with Liberian partners and communities – we have
bent the curve of the epidemic and placed it on a much
improved trajectory. We have gone from over 1,000 new
suspected, probable, and confirmed Ebola cases a week in
October, to just a handful of new cases per week in Liberia.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2015/02/11/fact-sheet-progress-our-ebola-response-home-and-abroad
•
Ebola
Recovery and Development Investments
The United States is committed to working with Liberians to rebuild and recover from the devastating impact of the Ebola epidemic on their livelihoods, health, and families. We are ensuring that the new capabilities drawn from the response efforts, including laboratory systems, surveillance, and health care workers trained in infection prevention and control, remain and bolster the Liberian capacity to implement the Global Health Security Agenda to prevent, detect, and respond to future threats. We are prioritizing investments to restore and expand health services to address declines in maternal and child health, declines in immunization rates, and increases in malaria. We are investing in the economic recovery and development of Liberia.
• The Overseas Private
Investment Corporation (OPIC) has made major efforts to
identify eligible U.S. investors willing to invest in
Liberia in the aftermath of the civil war. The agency
provided long-term loans and risk insurance to realize those
investments and has been able to build a portfolio of loans
that now includes a school, a small and medium enterprise
loan company, and housing. In the wake of the Ebola
outbreak, OPIC is working with portfolio investors in
Liberia to weather the crisis as the Liberian economy
recovers from the Ebola epidemic. This fall, the President
and Chief Executive Officer of OPIC will lead a delegation
to West Africa and will include a stop in Liberia. The visit
will lay the ground work for future OPIC involvement and
help introduce investors to potential opportunities in
Liberia.
• On February 25, the Liberian Government and
the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) signed a $2.8
million initial grant agreement to provide technical
assistance and analysis for the development and
implementation of an energy-focused compact. A future
compact would be aimed at providing more reliable and
affordable electricity to stimulate private sector-led
growth and development.
• The Export-Import Bank of the
United States has helped facilitate mutually-beneficial
trade for Liberia and the United States. Thanks to $3.7
million in financing support from Ex-Im Bank, 10,000 metric
tons of American wheat was exported to Liberia, with private
sector partners on the transaction.
• The U.S. African
Development Foundation (USADF) recently announced a $3
million, three-year, Post-Ebola Food Security Initiative.
USADF will concentrate on building local capacity to meet
food security requirements. Complementing the work of
USAID’s Feed the Future program and the work of other U.S.
agencies, USADF will focus on the counties in Liberia
hardest hit by Ebola directly funding local producers,
coupled with technical support provided by local service
providers.
• In 2013, Liberia was selected as one of
the initial six focus countries under President Obama’s
Power Africa Initiative. Under our partnership with the
Ministry of Lands, Mines and Energy, Liberia’s Rural and
Renewable Energy Agency, and the World Bank, our goal is to
increase energy service to as many as 800,000 Liberian
households and businesses over the next five
years.
• Peace Corps will soon send back an initial
group of volunteers, who were evacuated last year on account
of the Ebola epidemic. The volunteers will serve as English,
math, and science teachers in Liberia’s secondary
schools.
•
Mentoring Liberian Security
Forces
• DOD has helped build the capacity of the Armed
Forces of Liberia with a consistent presence of expert
advisors as part of Operation Onward Liberty. We are
increasing the number of embedded advisors to 45 personnel
as part of our Ebola transition to fully resume the joint
training engagements that the epidemic disrupted.
• The
State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and
Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) program in Liberia provides
training, mentoring, and technical assistance to key actors
in the justice system, including prosecutors, public
defenders, and court reporters and clerks with the goal of
strengthening the justice system in the country and building
the administrative and fiscal capacity of the Ministry of
Justice.
• The INL program in Liberia is working with
the Liberian National Police (LNP), both in concert with the
UN Police (UNPOL) and through its bilateral program, to
build capacity and enhance accountability. INL has had
success establishing the Emergency Response Unit and the
Police Support Unit and continues to heavily engage with
senior leadership and professional standards and finance
divisions.
• INL works with the Liberian Drug
Enforcement Agency to increase its capacity to disrupt drug
trafficking and reduce drug demand. Our technical training
and assistance has resulted in the first drug law for
Liberia as well as deployment to all of Liberia’s sea and
airports.
• Since 2005, the U.S. government has
invested over $108 million toward the development of the
Justice Sector and LNP. Including the Armed Forces of
Liberia, the U.S. has invested over $411 million in Security
Sector Assistance to Liberia.
• The United States
currently contributes 9 uniformed personnel in support of
the UN Mission in Liberia’s (UNMIL) efforts to support the
Government of Liberia to solidify peace and
stability.
• DOD has also provided support to the
Liberian Institute for Biomedical Research and the
associated National Reference Laboratory, and has supported
the development and professionalization of the Armed Forces
of Liberia, including in engineering and other support to
the Ebola response.
•
Investing in Reconciliation
and Conflict Prevention
• Under the State Department’s
Office of Global Women’s Issues (S/GWI), the Global Women
Peace and Security Initiative has invested over $750,000
since 2013 in small grants to fund projects that advance the
outcomes and actions committed to under the Protection from
Violence and Conflict Prevention pillars of the U.S.
National Action Plan on Women, Peace, and
Security.
• An ongoing project seeks to increase the
ability of rural Liberian women to influence security
policymaking by facilitating dialogue between women and
security institutions. These efforts will build safer
communities by empowering women in Liberia’s border
counties to become actively involved in community security
discussions and by strengthening local mechanisms to protect
women and girls from sexual and gender-based
violence.
• Since 2012, S/GWI has also invested over $2
million in the Women’s Health Innovation Program, which
provides evidence-based pregnancy and parenting materials to
at-risk Liberian women and their families and coordinates
health, education and community development systems, in an
effort to improve maternal and child health and
literacy.
• Working across nearly all of Liberia’s 15
counties, USAID helps communities create economic
opportunities to reintegrate internally displaced persons,
ex-combatants and others affected by the
war.
ENDS