Liberia's president-elect mulling Taylor's fate
Liberia’s president-elect Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf said today she’s deliberating on what should be done about Charles Taylor who is in exile in Nigeria but wanted in Sierra Leone on war crimes charges.
Nigeria granted Taylor – a longtime warlord and ex-president of Liberia who helped fuel Sierra Leone’s 1991-2002 civil war – asylum in 2003 in part to help end Liberia’s own 1989-2003 armed struggle.
Nigeria says it won’t hand Taylor to a UN-backed war crimes tribunal unless requested by a democratically elected Liberian leader, which Johnson-Sirleaf is set to become on January 16 when she takes over from a transitional government.
“We have been juggling with this matter of Charles Taylor,” she told reporters after meeting Sierra Leone President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah, a longtime Taylor foe.
“Because I believe in justice, we shall take a decision that would safeguard the security and integrity of Liberia,” she said without elaborating.
The Freetown-based UN court has accused Taylor of war crimes and crimes against humanity stemming from his support of brutal Sierra Leone rebels known for hacking off the lips, ears and limbs of civilians with machetes.
Taylor helped the insurgents trade gems mined in Sierra Leone’s rich diamond fields for guns and helped direct the rebel attacks against Freetown-based governments.
Johnson-Sirleaf is set to become Africa’s first-ever elected female leader. Her opponent in Liberia’s first post-war election, George Weah, gave up his legal fight to quash results in the election he branded fraudulent but deemed largely free and fair by international observers.
Liberia’s burgeoning peace is seen as a lynchpin for calm across West Africa, long roiled by strife and fighters emanating from Liberia.
