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UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs |
LIBERIA-NIGERIA-SIERRA LEONE: What next for Taylor?
MONROVIA, 27 Mar 2006 (IRIN) - President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf said on Monday that her government is not seeking her predecessor Charles Taylor’s extradition to Liberia as it is the UN-backed Special Court in Sierra Leone that has indicted him for war crimes.
Taylor, Liberia’s one-time rebel leader turned elected president, stepped down from office under intense international pressure to strike a peace deal in August 2003 and took exile in Nigeria, ending 14 years of on-off civil war.
But on Saturday the government of Nigeria said that Liberia was “free to take” Taylor, leading to speculation that he could be Africa’s first former head of state to face trial for war crimes.
“I made it clear, very clear, that former president Taylor was not indicted in a Liberian court. Therefore there is no reason for him to be extradited to Liberia. He was indicted by the UN Special Court [in Sierra Leone],” Sirleaf said on Monday.
“Liberia has no means to carry out the wishes of the international community. The institution that has the responsibility to take him to court, is the institution that indicted him,” she added. “Liberia was not a party to any deal to take Taylor out of here [Nigeria].”
Taylor has been indicted by the Special Court on 17 counts including war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in supporting brutal Sierra Leonean rebels known for hacking off the hands and feet of their victims.
President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria repeatedly said that he would hand over Taylor on the request of an elected Liberian government. That request came from Sirleaf earlier this month while she was on a tour of the United States, Liberia’s biggest potential donor to help rebuild the war battered country and also a proponent of bringing Taylor to trial.
This week Obasanjo too is scheduled to visit the United States, where he is scheduled to meet with President George Bush on Wednesday and could face the same pressure to haul Taylor before the judges as Sirleaf did, say diplomats.
Some observers think Obasanjo should have expressly said Taylor should be sent to the Special Court. “I see the move of Obasanjo as just buying time, as a way to take some of the pressure off himself. He knows that Liberia is not in a position to take Taylor into custody,” said John Caulker head of Sierra Leone’s Forum of Conscience.
The affair is a sensitive one for African heads of state and would set a new precedent, removing immunity and opening a host of serving, retired and exiled leaders to the threat of prosecution. Already African leaders are facing a decision on whether to have former Chadian President Hissene Habre brought to justice, also for war crimes. But Habre’s case brings all the more angst among African leaders because he would face trial not on African soil but in Europe, where Chadians filed suit against him. The AU in January sidestepped a decision on whether to extradite Habre – currently living in exile in Senegal – to Belgium, ruling that a panel of African jurists would have to consult on the matter and report back at an AU summit in July.
And as the debate continues, Desmond de Silva, the prosecutor of the Sierra Leone Special Court warned that Taylor, reckoned to be a multi-millionaire, could make good his escape. “The watching world will wish to see Taylor held in Nigerian detention to avoid the possibility of him using his wealth and associates to slip away, with grave consequences to the stability of the region," de Silva said in statement on Sunday.
It was not clear from government and local sources whether Taylor remained at his seafront mansion in the south-eastern Nigerian town of Calabar on Monday.
Unease in Monrovia and Freetown
While many Liberians broadly welcome Taylor being brought to justice, many are nervous that his arrival in neighbouring Sierra Leone could destabilise the country’s new-found peace.
Since the weekend the UN, which operates a 15,000-strong peacekeeping force in Liberia, has beefed up security. Heavily armed peacekeepers patrolled the capital Monrovia’s city centre in tanks and vehicles were thoroughly searched at check points.
Just 300 kilometres away in the Sierra Leonean capital Freetown, reactions to the Taylor’s possible arrival were mixed.
“Let the international community offer surveillance and patrol our borders” if they want to try Taylor, said Victor Bangura, a 25-year-old student in Freetown.
“He [Taylor] is a very, very volatile man with a lot of support and when he comes here I believe his supporters will come here, too…. Bringing Taylor to stand trial now is very risky,” he said, explaining that the Special Court building is in central Freetown and any trouble at the court could affect security across the capital.
But for many of Sierra Leone’s war victims, there is no time to waste in putting Taylor in the dock and making an example of him to other African heads of state.
“Charles Taylor was the one who made us face war and war has left us with permanent disabilities and set back our country. Personally I would be happy to see him face trial, to show that what he did was wrong,” said Alhaji Ahmed Jusu Jarka, chair of the national amputees and war wounded association.
Jusu Jarka is himself a double amputee – Sierra Leonean rebel fighters hacked off both his hands during the war.
“This would send a message to the sub-region that what he did was wrong and that leaders must set an example,” Jarka added. “I want [Africa’s leaders] to always have this in the back of their minds.”
[ENDS]
This material comes to you via IRIN, a UN humanitarian information unit, but May not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations or its agencies. If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this item, please retain this credit and disclaimer. Quotations or extracts should include attribution to the original sources. All materials copyright © UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2006
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