Sierra Leone president says calm restored, most leaders of barracks attack detained

Sierra Leone President Julius Maada Bio said most of the leaders of an attack on a military barracks in the capital Freetown earlier on Sunday had been arrested, adding that security operations and an investigation were ongoing. "We will ensure that those responsible are held accountable," Bio said on national television. "As your commander-in-chief, I want to assure everybody who is resident in Sierra Leone that we have overcome this challenge," he said, and calm had been restored. Earlier, the government said security forces had repelled "renegade soldiers" who attempted to break into a military armoury in Freetown during the early hours of Sunday. A nationwide curfew was imposed. Gunfire was heard across the city as the assailants attacked a prison and a police station. It was not immediately clear if there were any casualties in the barracks attack or during the gunfire in Freetown on Sunday. The West African country's civil aviation authority urged airlines to reschedule flights after the curfew was declared, while a soldier on its frontier with neighbouring Guinea told Reuters they had been instructed to shut the border. A Reuters journalist, who earlier witnessed an armed group of men commandeer a police vehicle near the Wilberforce barracks, said streets were mostly empty on Sunday as residents hunkered down. "We'll clean this society. We know what we are up to. We are not after any ordinary civilians who should go about their normal business," one of the masked men, who was dressed in military fatigues, said before driving away.