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FREETOWN, Sierra Leone (AP) - Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair pledged Monday to help Sierra Leone court private investment aimed at restoring the country's war-wrecked infrastructure and developing its agriculture and tourism industries.
Blair, on a one-day visit to the capital Freetown, said he would be working as a consultant to the former British colony's government.
«Sierra Leone has the potential, which has to be nurtured and developed, and I would be very happy to go out to the international community to say that Sierra Leone is a good country to come to and invest,» Blair said at a joint news conference with President Ernest Bai Koroma.
Koroma described Blair as a «special friend to Sierra Leone,» and praised his leadership in the British intervention that helped end a decade of fighting in the West African country in 2002.
Koroma _ who took office last year _ said he told Blair that Sierra Leone's priorities were energy, road infrastructure, agriculture and tourism.
Blair promised «to do what I can to see that major international investors come to this country and to get the private sector to support President Koroma's vision.
He said the peaceful transition of power to Koroma's government should show foreigners that Sierra Leone was now stable and ready for private enterprise.
The former British prime minister is playing a similar consulting role in Rwanda, a Blair spokesman said.

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