OWN CORRESPONDENT, Dakar | Friday 7.00pm.
THE United States has airlifted former warlord and now fugitive Roosevelt Johnson out of Liberia on Friday to end a week-long standoff that began when he sought refuge inside the American Embassy in Monrovia.
One helicopter swooped down on a small landing pad at the back of the sprawling embassy compound, picked up Johnson and ferried him away amid heavily armed protection. A second helicopter arrived shortly afterward to pick up several other people. Although it was not known where Johnson was headed, embassy officials said the helicopters — both civilian — came from Freetown, the capital of neighboring Sierra Leone.
In Washington, US officials said Johnson planned to go through Sierra Leone en route to a third country, which was not disclosed.
The airlift follows days of negotiations with President Charles Taylor’s government, a US embassy official said on Friday. Taylor has urged the United States to hand Johnson over to the government, but the president’s spokesman on Thursday said there would be no effort to block a move to ferry Johnson away.
Johnson, Taylor’s main rival, has been holed up in the embassy for a week, following attempts to arrest him and 22 of his followers for treason. The embassy, which did not want Johnson in the compound in the first place, has been forced to protect him.
Liberian soldiers apparently fired on his group as they were trying to arrange for refuge at the sprawling seaside compound. At least three of Johnson’s supporters were killed and two Americans were injured.
The body of Madison Wion, one of Johnson’s men, has subsequently been “temporarily” buried in the compound because the Liberian Government has refused to accept it. Wion died in “a foreign land”, Liberian authorities said, and refused to allow it back on to Liberian soil.
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