SECOND REFUGEE SHIP SEEKING AFRICAN PORT.

Byline: Beth Duff-Brown Associated Press 

A second ship teeming with sick and hungry people fleeing the fighting in Liberia sought a West African port of refuge Saturday, as authorities determined whether to let them ashore.

More than 1,300 refugees were on the merchant vessel Victory Reefer, which anchored 10 miles off Freetown, Sierra Leone, about 250 miles northwest of the Liberian capital of Monrovia.

They were largely citizens of Sierra Leone, unlike the Liberian refugees aboard the leaky Bulk Challenge, which was off Ghana and about 600 miles east of Monrovia.

When the Challenge attempts to dock, the captain may be forced once again to limp back out to sea.

Like the Ivory Coast authorities who turned away the freighter that left the embattled Liberian capital a week ago, Ghana wants little to do with the 3,000 to 4,000 refugees on board the craft, some of whom are suffering from severe diarrhea.

Medical workers fear the diarrhea outbreak is a sign of cholera, which is often fatal if not immediately treated.

``We don't want to take any more refugees,'' Ghanaian Foreign Min-ister Obed Asamoah said Saturday. He expressed concern that many of the refugees on the Bulk Challenge were faction fighters responsible for destroying the Liberian capital Monrovia in a month of bloodshed and vandalism.

``We have had enough refugees,'' he said. ``Especially we don't want those who are combatants.''

Ghanaian authorities will board the boat when it arrives sometime this weekend to screen refugees who have medical needs, but the others will be forced to remain on board. He said Ghanaians, foreigners and Liberian workers for United Nations and relief agencies would be allowed to disembark.

A decision on whether to allow the Victory Reefer to dock at Free-town would also have to wait until it was determined if any of the passengers were armed Liberian fighters, Liberian naval sources said.

The Sierra Leone navy brought food and medical supplies to the Victory Reefer, saying on their return that sanitary conditions were appalling and food and medical supplies were very low.

Although they were told there were 1,152 Sierra Leoneans, 61 U.N. personnel and 121 people of other nationalities on the ship, the actual total seemed to be considerably higher, the naval sources said.