CRI听力:Liberian FM Calls on African Nations to Re-open Borders

Liberia's government is calling on African nations to lift their travel bans and re-open their borders to help Liberian authorities cope with the current Ebola outbreak.

Liberian officials say the movement of essential supplies is being blocked because of the restrictions.

Liberian Foreign Minister Augustine Kpehe Ngafuan.

"We regret that some of our African brothers and sisters are taking actions that (are) disproportionate vis-a-vis the magnitude of the problem and that in spite of expert advice that has come from the WHO, the United Nations, even the AfDB (African Development Bank), some of them are still stuck in taking actions, some of which border on stigmatization. Our message to our African colleagues is that they need to revisit their actions."

The comments from the Liberian government have been made on the sidelines of a just-concluded emergency meeting of the African Union.

The UN's envoy for Liberia, Karin Landgren, is warning the Ebola crisis has political, security, economic and social implications beyond Liberia's borders.

"The economy has suffered significantly. There are food shortages being reported and increased food prices in the country. Several political processes have now been put off due to Ebola. So, there are broader implications and reverberations of Ebola to which we have to be extremely attentive."

The World Health Organization is warning thousand more cases of Ebola are likely to occur in Liberia in the coming weeks.

So far around 23-hundred people have died from the current Ebola outbreak in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone.

Half of these deaths have occurred in the past three weeks.