An Oxford student who fled war-torn Sierra Leone - where rebels slaughtered his family - faces deportation unless a last-ditch campaign succeeds.

Trainee social worker Alfred Sahr Koineh, 33, of Ruskin College, escaped the west African country while working for the Red Cross after his parents and younger brother were burned alive.

His wife Melrose, 33, and their two boys Tamba, five, and Sahr, nine, were captured by rebel soldiers and have not been seen since.

Mr Koineh told the Oxford Mail: "It is hard to talk about the situation without reducing me to tears.

"I do not even know where my wife and children are. We are giving up hope that they are alive." Mr Koineh is battling to finish his studies and become a social worker in Oxfordshire. A Let Alfred Stay campaign has been set up by fellow student Alan York.

But a Special Adjudicator acting on behalf of the immigration department dismissed Mr Koineh's appeal to stay.

In a report, the adjudicator said: "Whilst there could certainly be no guarantee of safety if the appellant were to fall into the hands of the rebels, in that regard his position would be no different from that of any other Sierra Leonian citizen.

"There is no evidence that he would be at any greater risk than any other innocent citizen who found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time." Mr Koineh is hoping a judicial review will reject the adjudicator's decision. If that fails, he will rely on Home Secretary Jack Straw to allow him to stay.

During the war, innocent civilians have had their limbs hacked off by rebels demanding that their leader, Foday Sankoh of the Revolutionary United Front, was released from prison.

Mr Koineh fled to Britain five years ago but always wanted to return to his homeland. When his cousin was slaughtered, he applied for asylum.

He said today: "If I had gone back I would have been killed or left stranded. Most of the country was virtually destroyed, so the last hope was for the capital city, Freetown, to survive. But that has been attacked."He is now without a family and a home - reliant on Great Britain, the country which administrated Sierra Leone until April 1961, to offer him permanent sanctuary. Life was very different for Mr Koineh in the 1980s.

He said: "Before the war, life was really going on well. Where I come from is a mining town. People are interested in doing their own business and people were living very peacefully. Then the rebel war started in 1991."

In October 1992, while Mr Koineh was a volunteer with the Red Cross, the rebels attacked his home town of Koidu. His family were captured and he was beaten by rebel soldiers, who believed Red Cross workers passed information to government troops. He said: "I left home and between my house and my place of work the rebels launched their attack. I managed to go back home but they were no longer there.A lot of people were captured by the rebels using them as human shields. My other brother, who actually escaped, told me that my wife and children were rounded up."

The following April the rebels attacked Koidu again. His parents and younger brother, Kai, were burned alive in the family home. Two of his other brothers were forced to join the rebel army.

Mr Koineh was beaten by soldiers angry that his family was involved with the All People's Congress in Sierra Leone, where his father Sahr Koineh was the Chieftain Speaker for his Chieftain.

The rebel war leader, Sankoh, is currently in the hands of government troops and Freetown has been virtually destroyed.

Story date: Friday 12 March

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