Royal Irish Regiment personnel attached to a training mission in Sierra Leone were taken hostage near the village of Magbeni on 25 August 2000 by a rebel militia group known as the West Side Boys (WSB). Following negotiations with the leader, Foday Kally, five were released but six, along with the team’s Sierra Leonean Army liaison officer (SLA LO), remained as Kally’s prisoners.

The British government approved a rescue mission known as Operation BARRAS. The operation on the ground was undertaken by the Special Air Service and the Special Boat Service supported by elements of the 1st Battalion The Parachute Regiment. Following simultaneous attacks against two village locations of Magbeni and Gberi Bana on the morning of 10 September 2000, the five hostages and the SLA LO were rescued along with a number of civilian hostages. Twenty-five of the WSB were known to have been killed and eighteen, including the WSB leader, were taken prisoner. One rescuer was killed and twelve others were wounded, one seriously. A civilian was also killed during the fighting.

An Operational Service Medal, to the left (© Crown Copyright), was awarded to military personnel deployed to Sierra Leone on Op PALLISER (7 May-15 June 2000), the intervention by British forces in the Sierra Leone Civil War. When It ended on 15 June, the medal was awarded to personnel deployed to Sierra Leone on other operations. There are no clasps, but a rosette worn on the ribbon indicates that the wearer took part in Op BARRAS.