Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf said she wants ex-president Charles Taylor handed over to a war crimes tribunal for prosecution for his role in Sierra Leone’s civil war, with the agreement of African leaders.
Taylor was given asylum in Nigeria to help end the war and Johnson-Sirleaf said on Friday she and Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo agreed at a recent meeting to seek African leaders’ views before any handover.
”I have consulted with Nigerian President Obasanjo and asked him that we and the leaders of Africa, particularly those that were involved in the arrangements that took Mr Taylor to exile, now bring this matter to closure — and by closure I mean that that decision should be taken that would allow Mr Taylor to have his day in court,” Sirleaf said.
”We have also asked that in doing so, once the African leader decides upon that path, that they ensure that Mr Taylor has an opportunity for proceedings that are in an environment that is not hostile, that he has the full right of self-defence,” she told a news conference after addessing the United Nations Security Council.
Earlier, Obasanjo’s office issued a statement saying Liberia had asked for Taylor’s extradition. It said the Nigerian president was consulting with leaders from the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States, or Ecowas, who helped broker Taylor’s exile on how to respond.
”The president has indicated that Nigeria will take a decision on the Liberian government’s request based on the views of the AU and Ecowas and give an appropriate response,” it said.
Obasanjo had said previously he would consider any request by a democratically elected Liberian leader.
Johnson-Sirleaf, who became African’s first woman president after winning election in January, criticised Obasanjo and the international community for not acting much earlier to give Taylor his day in court.
If Obasanjo had sent Taylor to the tribunal in Sierra Leone, she said, ”not only would I have been more comfortable, but it would have been the right thing to do. The pressure that is being put on Liberia is in a way unfair.”
Johnson-Sirleaf said Liberia was taking ”a rather courageous but risky” stand because ”Liberia’s peace is fragile”.
”There are many loyalists in our country to Mr Taylor. There are many business interests he has. Whatever decision is taken by the African leadership must ensure that the safety of the Liberian people and the stability of our nation is not undermined,” she said.
Richard Dicker, head of the international justice programme at Human Rights Watch, said the group was ”greatly encouraged and impressed” by Johnson-Sirleaf’s focus on Taylor.
”Now it is time for Nigerian president Obasanjo to step up to the plate and do the right thing so that Taylor will be held to account for murder and mayhem,” he said.
Taylor has lived in exile in the southern Nigerian city of Calabar since being forced from power under a peace deal brokered in 2003 that ended a rebel assault on the capital, Monrovia. The former warlord plunged Liberia into years of civil war in 1989, when he led a small rebel band that invaded from neighbouring Côte d’Ivoire.
He was elected president in 1997 during a lull in fighting and is accused of committing crimes against humanity while in office by aiding and directing a Sierra Leone rebel movement and trading guns and gems with the insurgents infamous for chopping off the lips, ears and limbs of their civilian victims.
Fighting ended in 2001 in Sierra Leone, where other players in the conflict are also on trial at the UN-Sierra Leone tribunal.
Taylor is the highest profile of those accused.
Johnson-Sirleaf’s comments to reporters before her Security Council speech caused some confusion because she did not confirm Obasanjo’s statement that Liberia wanted Taylor to be extradited.
”Not being a lawyer, I don’t know how to judge this word extradition, since that is not a word that I used,” she told the news conference.
In her answers to questions, Sirleaf made clear that Liberia wants the Taylor issue resolved quickly.
She said she met with Obasanjo in response to the increasing international pressure and ”our sensitivity to the fact that this matter continues to hang over our heads constraining our effort to move our country forward and to raise the resources that we need for our development”.
In her speech to the council, Johnson-Sirleaf said Liberia ”is determined to address issues from our painful past, including the question of impunity, as well as the imperatives of national reconciliation, so that the country can move ahead”.
She said she asked Obasanjo ”to consult with colleagues in the subregion and the international community” on the resolution of the Taylor issue.
US Ambassador John Bolton told the Security Council that the United States supported efforts by Johnson-Sirleaf, Obasanjo ”and other African leaders to bring Charles Taylor to justice”.
Johnson-Sirleaf said Liberia’s three-million people will feel that justice is done when Taylor is out of the sportlight and the international community focuses on their desire for a new and better life after so many years of war. – Sapa-AP