Military

DATE=07/30/2003

TYPE=ON THE LINE

NUMBER=1-01370

TITLE=THE LIBERIAN CRISIS

INTERNET=Yes

EDITOR=OFFICE OF POLICY 619-0038

CONTENT=

THEME: UP, HOLD UNDER AND FADE

Host: The crisis in Liberia. Next, on the Line.

[music]

Host: Fighting has been raging for weeks in the West African country Liberia. Rebel groups have been shelling the capital, Monrovia, and have fought for control of the port city of Buchanan. Liberia's strong-man ruler, Charles Taylor, had promised to step down, but has not. Civilians, caught in the crossfire, have been pleading for outside intervention to stop the killing. Nigeria has promised to lead West African peacekeeping troops into Liberia, but wants other countries, or the United Nations, to pay for the deployment. United States Marines are moving into place off the coast of Liberia, but the U-S has called for regional powers to take the lead. What are the prospects for peace in Liberia? I'll ask my guests: Joseph Siegle, Douglas Dillon Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations; Reed Kramer, CEO of All Africa Global Media; James Butty, a correspondent for the Voice of America's English to Africa service and for West Africa magazine; and joining us by phone from New Jersey, Jeffrey Herbst, professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University. Welcome and thanks for joining us today. Joseph Siegle, who's fighting in Liberia? Who are the players?

Siegle: You've got three main groups. You've got Charles Taylor, who is the standing president of the country. You've got the LURD rebels. They're the main rebel group. They've been fighting for the last three years.

Host: And "LURD" stands for?

Siegle: It's Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy. And then the third group is a splinter group from LURD -- they broke away back in March. They're called MODEL, the Movement for Democracy in Liberia. They're made up mostly from the Krahn ethnic group of former president Samuel Doe. They're mainly based from the southeastern part of the country. They're the troops that have been taking the action in Buchanan that we've been focusing on here this past week.

Host: Reed Kramer, what's the state of affairs on the ground?

Kramer: The state of affairs is pretty abysmal for everybody in Monrovia. I'm sure it's terrible in Buchanan as well. We're not getting as much news from there. But the civilian population is cut off from basically all supplies of [potable] water, except what falls from the sky and there [are] really heavy rains. They don't have any food. Medicines are in short supply. Patients in the hospital are in desperate condition. So it's a really serious situation.

Host: James Butty, there being two separate rebel groups, is there fighting among those rebel groups as well, or is it just against the government?

Butty: Oh no, just against the government. There's no fighting between the two rebel groups. Just before we came on the air, I spoke with the LURD spokesperson, Kabineh J'anneh. He specifically called me to just say that they declared a unilateral cease-fire Tuesday, and just to tell me that the cease-fire was holding, and that their troops have begun moving back from certain positions inside Monrovia to the free port of Monrovia. Of course, he insisted that LURD forces were not going to abandon the free port. They were not going to leave until the peacekeepers come in. That was something that the Liberian government has rejected. I also spoke today with Louis Brown who is the minister of state for foreign affairs for Liberia. He is the chief mediator for the Liberian government. He insists that if the LURD does not move back to its regular positions prior to June seventeenth, then there is no deal. The unilateral cease-fire will not hold. On the ground in Buchanan, I spoke in Abijan before coming with Thomas Niman, who is the chairman of MODEL, and he claimed that MODEL was still in control of Buchanan, although we hear that the Liberian government forces are on the counterattack in Buchanan. He claimed that when he took the city, it was very easy. The citizens were rejoicing and they are still in control in Buchanan.

Host: Jeffrey Herbst, are you there by phone?

Herbst: Yes I am.

Host: Is there likely to be a cease-fire that will hold and would that avert the humanitarian crisis?

Herbst: No, I think not. First of all, the amount of command-and-control that the so-called or putative leaders have over the actual fighters is pretty limited. Second, I would anticipate that the various groups would begin to fight again if they thought they could change the facts on the ground before a peacekeeping force moves in, if it ever does move in. So I think that the likelihood of cessation of violence is very limited.

Host: Well, Jeff Siegle, is there a history of this conflict that's likely to determine how it's going to play out? How long has this fighting been going on? Why did it get started?

Siegle: Well, it's interesting. In fact, most people who are just hearing about Liberia now think that this conflict has been going on forever. In fact, Liberia has been one of the more stable countries in Africa historically. The conflict that we've been seeing really was initiated at the end of 1989. That's when Charles Taylor launched his insurrection against then- president Samuel Doe. This led to the deposing of Samuel Doe. But instead of ending at that time there was this breakdown in the respective rebel factions that really precipitated most of the violence and the conflict that we saw in Liberia between 1990 and 1997, when there was an election that was held that was administered by the United Nations. Charles Taylor won that election under somewhat cloudy circumstances. Yet, when he took power, he didn't try to embrace all the factions in Liberia. He instead tried to use his power to in fact exact some revenge on the various other political parties on the ground, which really planted the seeds for this latest round of conflict that we've seen. So, by 2000, we saw a resurgence in the conflict. LURD was formed. They started to launch attacks from the northwest of the country, and it quickly spread and has been gradually building till now we are concentrated in Monrovia. It's interesting because you talk about the history and in many ways, what we are seeing today has [an] eerie parallel to 1990 when Charles Taylor was the rebel leader, and he was trying to fence off Samuel Doe, and Doe was the defensive. All the control that he [Doe] maintained was in the capital. It's both a moment of opportunity to bring this conflict to a close once and for all, but it's also a moment of danger, where if not done well, you could see a splintering of each of the militias, and a flaring up of the conflict that is going to consume not only Liberia, but some of the neighboring countries.

Host: Reed Kramer, Charles Taylor has been indicted for war crimes trials by a prosecutor appointed by the U-N. How does that complicate this situation trying to get Charles Taylor to step down?

Kramer: It's an indicator, first, of how the conflict that was just described has spread into a regional conflict and has taken over all of West Africa, or least the part most closely touching Liberia. His indictment has to do with Sierra Leone, and so not for anything he's done in Liberia. He's accused of supporting a very brutal rebel army in Sierra Leone. And they say they have a lot of evidence for his indictment, which has come right in the middle of these negotiations that have been spearheaded by the West African states, ECOWAS [The Economic Community of West African States]. The regional community has made it a more complicated situation. The Nigerians have tried to solve it by offering him [Taylor] at least temporary asylum in Nigeria. As Jeffrey Herbst said, nothing is going to happen to stop the fighting until peacekeepers get there. That's what everybody's looking for now. Whether the West Africans can get on the ground, with support from outside, because they say they have to have outside support. They simply don't have the resources. They've got to get on the ground and stop the fighting. Then I think people could be moderately optimistic that the fighting at least would stop. The situation would still be grim.

But these troops are not really well armed. I mean, they can kill civilians at will. They can fight each other.

Host: These are the rebel troops?

Kramer: The rebel and the government [soldiers]. None of them have -- these aren't really well armed or well trained. These are young guys for the most part, wielding some guns, and causing a lot of havoc, but it can be stopped pretty easily.

Host: James Butty, is there any sense of Liberians on the ground, -- the average person living in Liberia -- is there a sense of who they would like to see prevail in this conflict?

Butty: I think what Liberians on the ground want right now is for the killing to stop. I am in contact with people on the ground on a daily basis. In Harbel, which is the Firestone company town, they thought they would be okay there, particularly those who went as far as Buchanan. They thought it would be okay. What happened with the fighting this week? They are coming back. Busloads of people, hundreds of people. I was talking to a friend of mine, my classmate in Harbel. He said, "Now we're being overwhelmed by the people returning from Buchanan." I think what the average Liberian wants now is for the fighting to stop. That's why everybody was with the Archbishop of Monrovia last night. He again articulated the need for the United States to step forward and provide whatever the West Africans need to go in. He made a very passionate plea. He spoke, and said he came there specifically to appeal to the United States, to the Bush administration, to step forward to help. Not only just to help, but to send in U-S troops. He said Liberians are being there [in] 1990. The United States did exactly what it's trying to do again. It sent warships down there [with] 3,000 marines, when there were not as many Americans in Liberia at that time to evacuate. At that time, Liberians were dying in the hundreds in that city, and the Marines did nothing. So this time, everybody is saying, President [Olusegun] Obasanjo of Nigeria just pointed out exactly what West Africans and Africans are feeling. West Africans came to the aid of Liberia in the nineties. They did a good job. The international community promised them, [saying] "We'll help you. Just go in." They went in there - poor countries. Take Mali, -- all these poor countries in West Africa -- they went in. They contributed troops. While they were sacrificing, [and] their soldiers were dying, they were also, Nigeria and the others, were spending twelve billion dollars for the bill for the intervention in Liberia. That's why when you see Nigeria's dragging its feet, I don't blame them.

Host: Let's bring Jeffrey Herbst into this again. Are you still there by phone?

Herbst: Yes, I am.

Host: What are all the issues involved in why the Bush administration is leaning to wanting West Africans to lead the peacekeeping forces?

Herbst: Well, they were going to lead in any event. It's a question if we can provide the logistical resources. But I think the bigger question is, sending troops in is not an [end] in and of itself. It's just a means to some end. Unfortunately, in the discussion about whether there should be an intervention in Liberia, it's been posed as whether to send troops or not, rather than [asking], "What is the political process that people want to see the troop intervention initiate?" Unfortunately, that's not been articulated at all. You can send in troops, and the fighting will stop, at least temporarily, because no one wants to go against heavily armed soldiers. But then you have to have some kind of vision of what happens after that. I think one of the reasons the Bush administration has been hesitant is because there isn't an articulate vision of what the political process is.

Butty: I think I want to intervene there. There is a political -- The last two months there has been a political process going in Accra, Ghana. I was speaking to all the participants just this week, and all they're telling me, is that they don't have a way forward, of that political process going [forward], as long as people are dying in Monrovia. Why [would] you want to worry about putting together a transitional government to take over from Charles Taylor, when people are dying, when you haven't even solved the fighting, and you want to put together a transitional government. So they are saying, "Hold on. Let's bring a cease-fire first."

Host: Joseph Siegle, which comes first: the cease-fire, or the beginning of some sort of political solution?

Siegle: Well, I don't see them as being counter to each other. I agree with Jeffrey that this has to happen within a political context, and James is right. There is the framework of that in place that ECOWAS has been engineering. So, we aren't doing this in a vacuum. I think until we could -- we're not going to really seize any real political progress until people feel secure. So, I am advocating a U-S intervention. Negotiate a cease- fire, but go ahead and get the troops on the ground. That will serve as an important buffer between the various factions. That will reduce the high levels of distrust, the violence. It will allow humanitarian assistance to get in, and then we can deal substantively with the political dimensions. But we don't just send in troops for the sake of sending in troops, or even just to deal with the humanitarian dimensions. There has to be a political solution. The incredible humanitarian needs there are a symptom of the political disintegration that's occurred, so we need to be focusing on that.

Kramer: It seems to me there's a bit of a stalemate on all fronts, and that everybody shares some of the blame here. You're right James. There's been a political process going on in Ghana, but it hasn't moved very well. It hasn't had a lot of pace, and the ECOWAS negotiators haven't always been there. The parties themselves have continued to be -- because they've agreed on most of the points, but there are some key issues that haven't been resolved. Of course, the role of the rebel armies has been really a tough one because they want a larger role. They want something like what's happened in Congo, where they got to be vice presidents, and the Liberians and ECOWAS are saying, "No way. You can't fight yourself into a position of vice president." So it's tough, but it needs to happen. The United States has been slow to act. ECOWAS hasn't moved on the timetable it had hoped to do. The ECOWAS executive secretary has been in New York this week trying to find ways to get the United Nations to be helpful, and the United Nations is trying to be helpful, I think, within limits. They're trying to figure out whether they could move some resources from Sierra Leone over to Liberia just so that some action can happen. I think possibly if some of it got moving then other parts might. It's a hopeful view, but it's something that everybody wants to try.

Host: Well, Jeffrey Herbst, Joseph Siegle says that the U-S should lead an intervention at this point. Do you agree with that?

Herbst: Yes, I do.

Host: How would that take place?

Herbst: In terms of what?

Host: Is it just a matter of U-S troops going in? At the point at which U-S troops go in -- let's say they are able to secure the peace -- what do they do then? Do they put in place a military government in Liberia, or how else would it work?

Herbst: That's an excellent question, and it goes back to my comment before. I support an intervention. I think it's outrageous, the humanitarian situation now. I'm extremely dubious about the process to date, including what's happening in Ghana, and I'm extremely dubious about the proclaimed leaders of the different factions, who have their current stature simply because they're able to control some people with guns. A beginning of a durable peace process would include a process by which leaders came forth on the basis of something other than how many fighters they controlled. How to get there and even how to begin that process is an extremely difficult problem. People have said, "Well, the British intervened in Sierra Leone, and the fighting came down pretty quickly." But in Sierra Leone, there was a democratically elected government -- albeit a pretty weak one, with a problematic leader. But he was there, and he was recognized as the leader. If and when Taylor leaves, I think the process ahead of us is murky. But I think we have to devote as much attention to that as the actual logistics and operational questions of the military, which can go ahead, but you just have to begin to tailor some kind of political process. I don't think what's gone on to date is really going to be the foundation for something.

[simultaneous talking]

Butty: I'd like to clarify that.

Host: James Butty.

Butty: The reason you feel dubious about the process is because number one if Charles Taylor and the two rebel groups said, "We want foreign troops to come," let's call [their] bluff and go in. Let the international community call these peoples' bluff. Charles Taylor says, "Send in the troops, and we'll pack up and leave." Let's do that. About the process, it's not going to be a military government. The discussions in Ghana are focusing on establishing a transitional government that will follow the trend of the Liberian constitution. The reason that we have the fighting right now is because we have not responded to these people the way they want to be responded to. They said, "Send peacekeeping troops." If we had sent in the peacekeeping troops, by this time, the LURD would not feel that it's in a position to go and take over Monrovia. Now, we've put in the position where they feel they can now go on and finish the old process, then take over. I'm talking to other people in Accra this week, and they're telling that, perhaps now the two rebel groups are thinking about coming together and excluding the political parties and civil society in any government system. The reason they feel that way is because they feel they have an advantage on the battlefield. If the international community had gone in, as they requested, Charles Taylor by now, probably he would be out, and the rebels would be forced to go back, because I don't think they [would] want to attack an international force led by the United States.

Host: We have a little less than a minute to go at this point. George Siegle, on this issue that James Butty raises, do you think that the rebels are in a position to push Charles Taylor out at this point and change the facts on the ground?

Siegle: I think they do feel that they have the initiative and they're going to go for the jugular. I don't think they have the capacity to finally defeat Taylor's forces, and then to hold the city. I think there's not a military resolution to this conflict.

Host: Reed Kramer, about ten seconds.

Kramer: The first step has to be humanitarian assistance. President [George] Bush said that in his press conference on Wednesday, that should be the first objective, and I think everyone would agree. Get the troops in, get the humanitarian assistance flowing.

Host: I'm afraid that's going to be the last word for today. We're out of time. I'd like to thank my guests: Joseph Siegle, of the Council on Foreign Relations; Reed Kramer, of All Africa Global Media; James Butty, of the Voice of America and West Africa magazine, and joining us by phone from New Jersey, Jeffrey Herbst of Princeton University. Before we go, I'd like to invite you to send us your questions or comments. You can e-mail them to OnTheLine@IBB.GOV. For On the Line, I'm Eric Felten.