March 3, 2003
The Chief Prosecutor of the Special Court for Sierra Leone, David Crane, signs and files the indictment against Charles Taylor while he was sitting president of Liberia.
March 7, 2003
The Trial Chamber of the Special Court for Sierra Leone confirms the indictment against Charles Taylor and orders it to remain under seal.
June 4, 2003
The Prosecutor unseals the indictment while Charles Taylor was attending peace talks with other African leaders in Ghana. African heads of state seek to convince Mr. Taylor to step down as president of Liberia in order to bring the Liberian conflict to a peaceful conclusion.
July 23, 2003
Lawyers on behalf of Charles Taylor file a Motion made under protest and without waiving of immunity accorded to a head of state President Charles Ghankay Taylor, requesting that the Trial Chamber quash the approved indictment of March 7, 2003.
July 28, 2003
The prosecution files a Response to the defense Motion to quash the indictment against Charles Taylor.
July 30, 2003
Defense lawyers for Charles Taylor file a Reply to the Prosecution’s Response to the Applicant’s Motion made under protest and without waiving of immunity accorded to a head of state President Charles Ghankay Taylor.
August 11, 2003
Charles Taylor steps down as president of Liberia and went into exile in Calabar, Nigeria.
December 4, 2003
Interpol issues a “Red Notice” (international arrest warrant) for Charles Taylor while he was an asylee in Calabar, Nigeria
May 31, 2004
The Appeals Chamber dismisses the Motion brought on behalf of Charles Taylor on July 23, 2003 that challenged his indictment on the grounds of sovereign immunity and extraterritoriality.
March 6, 2006
Prosecutors file a Motion for leave to amend the indictment against Charles Taylor
March 16, 2006
The Trial Chamber approves an amended indictment, reducing the counts in the indictment against Charles Taylor from 17 to 11.
March 29, 2006
Charles Taylor is apprehended by Nigerian authorities after a request for his arrest from Liberian president Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf. He is flown to Monrovia, where he was arrested by United Nations Peacekeeping Forces in Liberia. On the same day, he is transferred to the custody of the Special Court for Sierra Leone.
April 3, 2006
Charles Taylor made his initial appearance before Special Court for Sierra Leone judges in Freetown. He pleaded not guilty to all charges against him.
June 16, 2006
UN Security Council Resolution 1688 clears the way for Taylor to be tried in The Hague instead of Freetown, saying that his presence in the sub-region was “an impediment to stability and a threat to the peace”.
June 30, 2006
Charles Taylor was transferred to The Hague, where his trial would be conducted by Special Court for Sierra Leone judges.
June 4, 2007
The Chief Prosecutor of the Special Court for Sierra Leone, Steven Rapp, makes his opening statement in The Hague. Charles Taylor refuses to attend the trial and dismisses his legal team, saying that he did not have enough resources for the preparation of his defense. The trial is adjourned until new counsel was assigned to him.
January 7, 2008
Charles Taylor’s trial begins in earnest as the prosecution called its first witness to testify. The prosecution’s first witness was Ian Smillie, an expert witness on diamonds in the West African sub-region. Charles Taylor’s new team of lawyers, led by British practicing lawyer Courtenay Griffiths QC make their first appearance in court.
May 14, 2008
Charles Taylor’s former vice president Moses Blah commences his testimony as a witness for the prosecution. Mr. Blah was led in evidence by the then Chief Prosecutor Stephen Rapp.
May 15, 2008
Charles Taylor’s former Vice President, Moses Blah, testifies about the death/execution of RUF commander Sam Bockarie, allegedly by security forces loyal to Charles Taylor.
May 19, 2008
Charles Taylor’s defense counsel Courtenay Griffiths commences the cross-examination of former Liberian president Moses Blah.
May 21, 2008
Former Liberian President Moses Blah concludes his testimony as a witness for the prosecution.
January 30, 2009
The last prosecution witness, a double amputee, testifies about his ordeal in the hands of Sierra Leonean rebels during the January 1999 rebel invasion of the Sierra Leonean capital Freetown. In all, prosecutors led a total of 91 witnesses, 58 of whom were crime base witnesses, 29 insider (linkage) witnesses and four expert witnesses. In addition, written statements were admitted from four crime base witnesses and reports were admitted from two additional expert witnesses.
February 27, 2009
Prosecutors close their case against Charles Taylor.
April 7, 2009
Charles Taylor’s defense lawyers make an oral submission of “No Case to Answer or Motion for Judgment of Acquittal” to the judges stating prosecutors had failed to prove their case against Mr. Taylor.
April 11, 2009
Prosecutors make an oral response to the defense oral submission of “No Case to Answer/Motion for Judgment of Acquittal.”
May 4, 2009
The Trial Chamber dismisses in its entirety the defense application of “No Case to Answer/Motion for Judgment of Acquittal.”
July 13, 2009
The defense opens their case with an opening statement by Charles Taylor’s defense counsel, Courtenay Griffiths. Mr. Griffiths says that Mr. Taylor was not guilty of the charges against him and that the trial was a conspiracy by western countries, specifically the United States and the United Kingdom, to effect regime change in Liberia.
July 13, 2009
Charles Taylor takes the witness stand and commences his testimony as a witness in his own defense.
July 17, 2009
Charles Taylor in his testimony alleges CIA involvement in his jail break from a Massachusetts prison.
July 21, 2009
Charles Taylor testifies that he did not know about the establishment of the RUF, the rebel group that he is accused of helping to establish and supporting to wage war in Sierra Leone.
July 27, 2009
Charles Taylor testifies that the international community consented to his contacts with the RUF while he was president of Liberia. He said that all such contact was geared towards bringing peace to Sierra Leone.
July 31, 2009
Charles Taylor in his testimony accuses the United Nations of linking him with RUF rebels in Sierra Leone.
September 30, 2009
Charles Taylor calls allegations against him as “racist” and says that his trial is part of a regime change policy by Western countries.
November 10, 2009
Defense counsel Courtenay Griffiths concludes the direct-examination of Charles Taylor. Lead prosecutor Brenda Hollis immediately commences the cross-examination of Mr. Taylor.
December 1, 2009
Judges grant a prosecution request to use new evidence in the cross-examination of Charles Taylor. Such new evidence, the judges say, must be disclosed to the defense before their use in court.
December 7, 2009
The court takes an early Christmas break as judges grant the defense more time to study the documents disclosed as new evidence by prosecutors for the cross-examination of Charles Taylor.
January 11, 2010
Prosecutors resume the cross-examination of Charles Taylor.
February 5, 2010
Prosecutors conclude the cross-examination of Charles Taylor.
February 15, 2010
Defense lawyers commence the re-examination of Mr. Taylor.
February 19, 2010
Charles Taylor concludes his testimony as a witness in his own defense, telling the judges that prosecutors have not proved their case against him.
February 22, 2010
Charles Taylor’s first defense witness, a Gambian national who obtained Liberian citizenship Mr. Yanks Smythe, commences his testimony.
Source: Open Justice Initiative
Showing posts with label Special Court for Sierra Leone. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Special Court for Sierra Leone. Show all posts
Monday, February 22, 2010
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Sierra Leone RUF rebels sentenced
An international tribunal has jailed three former Sierra Leone rebel leaders for a total of nearly 120 years. All three were senior leaders in the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) and were convicted of overseeing atrocities during Sierra Leone's civil war.
Issa Sesay was sentenced to 52 years, Morris Kallon to 40 years and Augustine Gbao to 25 years. They were found guilty in February of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in the 1991-2001 conflict. "The chamber concluded that the inherent gravity of the criminal acts for which Sesay, Kallon and Gbao have been convicted is exceptionally high," the judges said. Tactics favoured by the rebels included amputating hands and arms or carving the initials RUF into the bodies of their victims. It is the last case to be held in the capital, Freetown, at the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone.
The RUF trial began in mid-2004 and the court heard about the rebel commanders' role in the conflict. "The crimes were committed on a massive scale... Sierra Leoneans were raped, enslaved, hacked to death and brutalised," the AFP news agency quotes presiding judge Pierre Boutet as saying. "The impact of the crimes on the Sierra Leonean society has been enormous," he added. The RUF was notorious for using the so-called Small Boys Units - child soldiers forcibly recruited and issued with AK-47 assault rifles - who had a reputation for particular cruelty among the civilian population. "Children were deprived of normal education and some of them had the letters of the RUF branded on them as if they were the organisation's property," Mr Boutet said. By the time the conflict ended, tens of thousands of people had been killed while tens of thousands were left mutilated, their arms, legs, noses or ears cut off.
Thirteen people were originally indicted by the tribunal, but RUF rebel leader Foday Sankoh and his deputy commander Sam Bockarie died before coming to trial. When the RUF leaders were found guilty in February, the judges concluded they "significantly contributed" to a joint criminal enterprise with former Liberian President Charles Taylor to control the diamond fields of Sierra Leone to finance their warfare. Mr Taylor faces 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity related to his role in the conflict. His trial has been moved to The Hague for security reasons.
Earlier this week, his lawyers called for the dismissal of the charges saying the prosecution had not presented sufficient evidence of his link with the abuses.
Source: BBC
Issa Sesay was sentenced to 52 years, Morris Kallon to 40 years and Augustine Gbao to 25 years. They were found guilty in February of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in the 1991-2001 conflict. "The chamber concluded that the inherent gravity of the criminal acts for which Sesay, Kallon and Gbao have been convicted is exceptionally high," the judges said. Tactics favoured by the rebels included amputating hands and arms or carving the initials RUF into the bodies of their victims. It is the last case to be held in the capital, Freetown, at the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone.
The RUF trial began in mid-2004 and the court heard about the rebel commanders' role in the conflict. "The crimes were committed on a massive scale... Sierra Leoneans were raped, enslaved, hacked to death and brutalised," the AFP news agency quotes presiding judge Pierre Boutet as saying. "The impact of the crimes on the Sierra Leonean society has been enormous," he added. The RUF was notorious for using the so-called Small Boys Units - child soldiers forcibly recruited and issued with AK-47 assault rifles - who had a reputation for particular cruelty among the civilian population. "Children were deprived of normal education and some of them had the letters of the RUF branded on them as if they were the organisation's property," Mr Boutet said. By the time the conflict ended, tens of thousands of people had been killed while tens of thousands were left mutilated, their arms, legs, noses or ears cut off.
Thirteen people were originally indicted by the tribunal, but RUF rebel leader Foday Sankoh and his deputy commander Sam Bockarie died before coming to trial. When the RUF leaders were found guilty in February, the judges concluded they "significantly contributed" to a joint criminal enterprise with former Liberian President Charles Taylor to control the diamond fields of Sierra Leone to finance their warfare. Mr Taylor faces 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity related to his role in the conflict. His trial has been moved to The Hague for security reasons.
Earlier this week, his lawyers called for the dismissal of the charges saying the prosecution had not presented sufficient evidence of his link with the abuses.
Source: BBC
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
First Sierra Leone war crimes verdicts
Three men have been convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity during Sierra Leone's decade-long war. These were the first verdicts of Sierra Leone's UN-backed war Special Court for Sierra Leone. Alex Tamba Brima, Brima Bazzy Kamara and Santigie Borbor Kanu were senior members of an armed faction that toppled the government in 1997. They were found guilty of 11 of the 14 charges, but acquitted of alleged sexual slavery and other inhuman acts. The men will be sentenced on 16 July.
The judges read out their verdicts before a packed courtroom in Sierra Leone's capital, Freetown. The three men face lengthy prison terms. During the conflict tens of thousands were killed as the rebel forces raped and mutilated defenceless innocent civilians.
The US-based Human Rights Watch hailed the verdict as "the first time that an international court has issued a verdict on child recruitment". The three had pleaded not guilty to the 14 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity including murder, rape and the use of child soldiers. They belonged to the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), which formed an alliance with the notorious Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels.
As the rebel groups attempted to hold power they were allegedly backed by the former president of Liberia, Charles Taylor, in return for Sierra Leone's diamonds. Following the end of the conflict five years ago, a UN-backed court was set up to try those people who bore the greatest responsibility for the atrocities committed. Trying all those who committed crimes would have been an impossible task says the BBC's West Africa correspondent, Will Ross. So many in Sierra Leone now live side-by-side with the very people they saw committing atrocities, he says.
The court has indicted 12 people, including http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Taylor_%28Liberia%29, although three of them have since died or are presumed to have died. Mr Taylor is currently in The Hague, where his war crimes trial is due to resume next week. His case was moved there to avoid unrest in Sierra Leone and Liberia. The head of the AFRC rebels was never apprehended but is presumed dead. The most notorious rebel leader, the RUF's Foday Sankoh, died in custody while awaiting trial.
Another high profile figure, former Interior Minister Sam Hinga Norman, died after surgery with his verdict pending. It may be slow and expensive but many view the court's work as an important step to help end impunity, our correspondent says.
Source: BBC
The judges read out their verdicts before a packed courtroom in Sierra Leone's capital, Freetown. The three men face lengthy prison terms. During the conflict tens of thousands were killed as the rebel forces raped and mutilated defenceless innocent civilians.
The US-based Human Rights Watch hailed the verdict as "the first time that an international court has issued a verdict on child recruitment". The three had pleaded not guilty to the 14 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity including murder, rape and the use of child soldiers. They belonged to the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), which formed an alliance with the notorious Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels.
As the rebel groups attempted to hold power they were allegedly backed by the former president of Liberia, Charles Taylor, in return for Sierra Leone's diamonds. Following the end of the conflict five years ago, a UN-backed court was set up to try those people who bore the greatest responsibility for the atrocities committed. Trying all those who committed crimes would have been an impossible task says the BBC's West Africa correspondent, Will Ross. So many in Sierra Leone now live side-by-side with the very people they saw committing atrocities, he says.
The court has indicted 12 people, including http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Taylor_%28Liberia%29, although three of them have since died or are presumed to have died. Mr Taylor is currently in The Hague, where his war crimes trial is due to resume next week. His case was moved there to avoid unrest in Sierra Leone and Liberia. The head of the AFRC rebels was never apprehended but is presumed dead. The most notorious rebel leader, the RUF's Foday Sankoh, died in custody while awaiting trial.
Another high profile figure, former Interior Minister Sam Hinga Norman, died after surgery with his verdict pending. It may be slow and expensive but many view the court's work as an important step to help end impunity, our correspondent says.
Source: BBC
Monday, July 5, 2004
Rebels face Sierra Leone tribunal
A UN-backed war crimes tribunal in Sierra Leone has begun hearing the first cases against members of the rebel Revolutionary United Front. The RUF is blamed for killings, rapes and abductions during a decade of civil war that ended in 2002. But the first three defendants - who include the RUF's final military leader Issa Sesay - are refusing to acknowledge the court's legitimacy.
About 50,000 people were killed, and many more maimed and raped in the war. The RUF's internal security chief, Augustine Gbao, and a key battlefield commander, Morris Kallon, are on trial alongside Issa Hassan Sesay. The RUF's campaign of violence included hacking off the limbs of civilians as a trademark act of terror. The BBC's Lansana Fofana in Freetown says that Mr Sesay occasionally lowered his head as the 18 war crimes charges, including sexual slavery, murder, looting and terrorising civilians, were read out.
Chief Prosecutor David Crane said that atrocities were committed in virtually all parts of Sierra Leone. "This is the day I have been waiting for," said one amputee. "I am now satisfied that someone is being held accountable for what the rebels did to me." But correspondents say the tribunal's importance has been diminished by the deaths of RUF leader Foday Sankoh his deputy Sam Bockarie - best known under his nom de guerre Mosquito.
The tribunal has not yet been able to arrest the man accused of being the RUF's paymaster, former Liberian President Charles Taylor. Despite being indicted on 17 charges of war crimes or crimes against humanity, Mr Taylor is living a life of luxury in exile in Nigeria. Unlike the war crimes tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, the court is based where the alleged crimes occurred and draws on both national and international law.
Source: BBC
About 50,000 people were killed, and many more maimed and raped in the war. The RUF's internal security chief, Augustine Gbao, and a key battlefield commander, Morris Kallon, are on trial alongside Issa Hassan Sesay. The RUF's campaign of violence included hacking off the limbs of civilians as a trademark act of terror. The BBC's Lansana Fofana in Freetown says that Mr Sesay occasionally lowered his head as the 18 war crimes charges, including sexual slavery, murder, looting and terrorising civilians, were read out.
Chief Prosecutor David Crane said that atrocities were committed in virtually all parts of Sierra Leone. "This is the day I have been waiting for," said one amputee. "I am now satisfied that someone is being held accountable for what the rebels did to me." But correspondents say the tribunal's importance has been diminished by the deaths of RUF leader Foday Sankoh his deputy Sam Bockarie - best known under his nom de guerre Mosquito.
The tribunal has not yet been able to arrest the man accused of being the RUF's paymaster, former Liberian President Charles Taylor. Despite being indicted on 17 charges of war crimes or crimes against humanity, Mr Taylor is living a life of luxury in exile in Nigeria. Unlike the war crimes tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, the court is based where the alleged crimes occurred and draws on both national and international law.
Source: BBC
Thursday, June 5, 2003
War Crimes Indictment of Liberian President Is Disclosed
President Charles Taylor of Liberia, widely viewed as a wellspring of the violence that has ravaged West Africa, has been indicted on war crimes charges by a special court in Sierra Leone that accused him of ''bearing the greatest responsibility'' for a decade's worth of murders, mutilations and rapes in the neighboring country. He is the second serving national leader to be indicted on war crimes charges in the last decade. The first was Slobodan Milosevic, who was indicted by the tribunal in The Hague while he was president.
The indictment by the court, run jointly by the United Nations and the Sierra Leone government, was originally issued on March 7. It was made public today shortly after Mr. Taylor, bowing to pressure from the leaders of Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa, announced that he would step down by the end of the year. Diplomatic officials and news reports from the region described a surreal diplomatic drama in which Mr.
Taylor was transformed from statesman to fugitive in a matter of minutes. The announcement came at the opening of a peace conference convened in Accra, Ghana, and designed to end Liberia's current civil war. Just after being applauded for his retirement announcement, Mr. Taylor left the peace conference abruptly and caught a plane home rather than risk arrest by his Ghanaian hosts. In the brief time that elapsed between the announcement of the indictment and Mr. Taylor's departure, various Ghanaian officials and West African diplomats said they did not know whether they would attempt an arrest, since Mr. Taylor's status as a head of state grants him automatic immunity from such actions, under various international treaties.
The train of events left deep frustration in at least two quarters, diplomatic officials said today. One senior United States official said today that Presidents Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and John Kufuor of Ghana felt sandbagged by the release of the indictment on the heels of their successful effort to get Mr. Taylor to resign. But both the Ghanaian government's delays and indecision about arresting Mr. Taylor, and his subsequent return home, left both the war crimes prosecutor's office and some Republican members of the international affairs committee of the United States House of Representatives confused or angry.
In a telephone interview, Luc Copè, the chief of prosecution for the court in Sierra Leone, said: ''We don't have any power of arrest. We depend on a state to execute our orders.'' He added, ''We can serve the warrant of arrest on Liberia. But that would be asking him to arrest himself.''
The indictment itself provided, in stilted legal language, a capsule history of the allegations of crossborder alliances between Mr. Taylor and insurgents in Sierra Leone, and his reported support for a war on civilians that left upwards of 200,000 people dead and hundreds of thousands more maimed or raped or homeless in the late 1990's.
Mr. Taylor originally was a rebel warlord in his own country, and on coming to power, his accusers have charged, he helped rebel groups in neighboring countries, effectively franchising out his own civil war first to Sierra Leone and later to the Ivory Coast. In the case of Sierra Leone, one of the prizes in the conflict was access to Sierra Leone's wealth of diamond mines. ''Victims were routinely shot, hacked to death and burned to death,'' in Sierra Leone, one count of the new indictment said. Another said ''widespread sexual violence committed against civilian women and girls included brutal rapes, often by multiple rapists.''
A third count, involving the mutilations of civilians whose limbs were hacked off, charged that ''these mutilations included cutting off limbs and carving'' the initials of rebel groups on the bodies of the victims. The war crimes court in Sierra Leone, created jointly by the United Nations and Sierra Leone's government 18 months ago, has already indicted several militia leaders from the Revolutionary United Front and the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council, who made common cause with Mr. Taylor's government.
The indictment unsealed today charged that Mr. Taylor had ''to obtain access to the mineral wealth of the Republic of Sierra Leone, in particular the diamond wealth of Sierra Leone, and to destabilize the state'' provided ''financial support, military training, personnel, arms, ammunition'' and other support to the R.U.F., which in turn allied itself with the A.F.R.C.
In a statement released in Freetown today, the chief prosecutor of the special court, David M. Crane, said that he had unsealed the indictment when he learned Mr. Taylor would be in Ghana for the peace talks, and thus would be susceptible to arrest. He added, ''To ensure the legitimacy of these negotiations, it is imperative that the attendees know they are dealing with an indicted war criminal.''
A member of Mr. Crane's staff, contacted by telephone in Freeport on Tuesday night, said that the news of the indictment prompted ''cheering in the streets'' of Sierra Leone's capital. In Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, The Associated Press reported that thousands of panicked civilians were running home from work to find their children, apparently fearful of renewed civil strife if Mr. Taylor's government fell.
Mr. Taylor's announcement today that he would resign was made, in the third person, to warm applause, The Associated Press reported. ''It has become apparent that some people believe that Taylor is the problem,'' he said. ''President Taylor wants to say that he intends to remove himself from the process.''
Sourc: New York Times
The indictment by the court, run jointly by the United Nations and the Sierra Leone government, was originally issued on March 7. It was made public today shortly after Mr. Taylor, bowing to pressure from the leaders of Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa, announced that he would step down by the end of the year. Diplomatic officials and news reports from the region described a surreal diplomatic drama in which Mr.
Taylor was transformed from statesman to fugitive in a matter of minutes. The announcement came at the opening of a peace conference convened in Accra, Ghana, and designed to end Liberia's current civil war. Just after being applauded for his retirement announcement, Mr. Taylor left the peace conference abruptly and caught a plane home rather than risk arrest by his Ghanaian hosts. In the brief time that elapsed between the announcement of the indictment and Mr. Taylor's departure, various Ghanaian officials and West African diplomats said they did not know whether they would attempt an arrest, since Mr. Taylor's status as a head of state grants him automatic immunity from such actions, under various international treaties.
The train of events left deep frustration in at least two quarters, diplomatic officials said today. One senior United States official said today that Presidents Thabo Mbeki of South Africa, Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and John Kufuor of Ghana felt sandbagged by the release of the indictment on the heels of their successful effort to get Mr. Taylor to resign. But both the Ghanaian government's delays and indecision about arresting Mr. Taylor, and his subsequent return home, left both the war crimes prosecutor's office and some Republican members of the international affairs committee of the United States House of Representatives confused or angry.
In a telephone interview, Luc Copè, the chief of prosecution for the court in Sierra Leone, said: ''We don't have any power of arrest. We depend on a state to execute our orders.'' He added, ''We can serve the warrant of arrest on Liberia. But that would be asking him to arrest himself.''
The indictment itself provided, in stilted legal language, a capsule history of the allegations of crossborder alliances between Mr. Taylor and insurgents in Sierra Leone, and his reported support for a war on civilians that left upwards of 200,000 people dead and hundreds of thousands more maimed or raped or homeless in the late 1990's.
Mr. Taylor originally was a rebel warlord in his own country, and on coming to power, his accusers have charged, he helped rebel groups in neighboring countries, effectively franchising out his own civil war first to Sierra Leone and later to the Ivory Coast. In the case of Sierra Leone, one of the prizes in the conflict was access to Sierra Leone's wealth of diamond mines. ''Victims were routinely shot, hacked to death and burned to death,'' in Sierra Leone, one count of the new indictment said. Another said ''widespread sexual violence committed against civilian women and girls included brutal rapes, often by multiple rapists.''
A third count, involving the mutilations of civilians whose limbs were hacked off, charged that ''these mutilations included cutting off limbs and carving'' the initials of rebel groups on the bodies of the victims. The war crimes court in Sierra Leone, created jointly by the United Nations and Sierra Leone's government 18 months ago, has already indicted several militia leaders from the Revolutionary United Front and the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council, who made common cause with Mr. Taylor's government.
The indictment unsealed today charged that Mr. Taylor had ''to obtain access to the mineral wealth of the Republic of Sierra Leone, in particular the diamond wealth of Sierra Leone, and to destabilize the state'' provided ''financial support, military training, personnel, arms, ammunition'' and other support to the R.U.F., which in turn allied itself with the A.F.R.C.
In a statement released in Freetown today, the chief prosecutor of the special court, David M. Crane, said that he had unsealed the indictment when he learned Mr. Taylor would be in Ghana for the peace talks, and thus would be susceptible to arrest. He added, ''To ensure the legitimacy of these negotiations, it is imperative that the attendees know they are dealing with an indicted war criminal.''
A member of Mr. Crane's staff, contacted by telephone in Freeport on Tuesday night, said that the news of the indictment prompted ''cheering in the streets'' of Sierra Leone's capital. In Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, The Associated Press reported that thousands of panicked civilians were running home from work to find their children, apparently fearful of renewed civil strife if Mr. Taylor's government fell.
Mr. Taylor's announcement today that he would resign was made, in the third person, to warm applause, The Associated Press reported. ''It has become apparent that some people believe that Taylor is the problem,'' he said. ''President Taylor wants to say that he intends to remove himself from the process.''
Sourc: New York Times
Thursday, March 13, 2003
Only Seven Arrest Warrants to date
Despite press reports to the contrary, the fact is that the Special Court has currently only issued arrest warrants for the following persons:
Foday Saybana Sankoh
Issa Hassan Sesay
Alex Tamba Brima
Morris Kallon
Sam Hinga Norman
Johnny Paul Koroma
Sam Bockarie
Source: Special Court for Sierra Leone
Foday Saybana Sankoh
Issa Hassan Sesay
Alex Tamba Brima
Morris Kallon
Sam Hinga Norman
Johnny Paul Koroma
Sam Bockarie
Source: Special Court for Sierra Leone
Wednesday, March 20, 2002
Sierra Leone War Crimes Court to Begin Deliberations in Fall
The United Nations is pressing ahead with arrangements for a special war crimes court in Sierra Leone that officials say will be leaner and less bureaucratic than the tribunals that were created to prosecute war criminals in the Balkans and Rwanda. The United Nations signed an agreement with Sierra Leone two months ago creating a legal framework for trying a score of defendants accused of atrocities in the West African country's civil war.
Ralph Zacklin, the assistant secretary general for legal affairs, visited Sierra Leone from Jan. 7 to 19 to lay the groundwork. He said today that the new court could start operating in Sierra Leone by this fall and return its first indictments before the end of the year. Mr. Zacklin briefed the Security Council on the proposed court on Tuesday. Today, he discussed some of the details.
The new court, he said, would enlist judges and lawyers in Sierra Leone as well as prominent jurists from outside the country. Secretary General Kofi Annan would appoint a majority of judges; the Sierra Leonean government would select the other judges and the chief prosecutor. The court in Sierra Leone would have a single trial chamber with three judges, two of them foreign. The appeals chamber would have five judges, three of them foreign. In a report last week to the Security Council, Mr. Annan said the United Nations mission in Sierra Leone, through its human rights section, was in a position to provide evidence of abuses to the prosecutor.
Three weeks ago, the Bush administration's war crimes ambassador, Pierre-Richard Prosper, criticized the tribunals for the Balkans and Rwanda, suggesting they were flawed by unprofessionalism and mismanagement. United Nations officials and other legal experts disputed Mr. Prosper's characterization. The tribunals for Rwanda and the Balkans have annual budgets of $100 million. The Sierra Leone special court, with a smaller staff, would get only $60 million over three years, financed by 15 to 20 countries, including the United States, Britain and the Netherlands. ''A lot of states are looking at the special court to see if this kind of court can work and if it can be leaner'' than the other tribunals, Mr. Zacklin said. He cited Cambodia, which has yet to bring to justice the Khmer Rouge officials who oversaw the killings of more than a million Cambodian civilians. ''I have no doubt whatsoever that the Cambodians are looking at what is happening in Sierra Leone,'' Mr. Zacklin said.
The defendants in Sierra Leone would include the likes of Foday Sankoh, a former army sergeant who headed the Revolutionary United Front. His insurgent group inspired terror by hacking off limbs of thousands of civilians, raping women and forcing children to fight. Some former rebels contend that government soldiers also committed atrocities and should be brought to account. The court is deemed essential for Sierra Leone's return to relative normality. With elections planned for May 14, the government has lifted the state of emergency to allow campaigning by political parties.
The United Nations had 17,400 troops deployed in Sierra Leone as of Jan. 31, making it the largest peacekeeping mission. Mr. Annan asked the Security Council to extend the mission's mandate, which expires at the end of this month, until Sept. 30. The secretary general said in his report that more than 47,000 combatants in Sierra Leone have put aside their weapons.
Source: New York Times
Ralph Zacklin, the assistant secretary general for legal affairs, visited Sierra Leone from Jan. 7 to 19 to lay the groundwork. He said today that the new court could start operating in Sierra Leone by this fall and return its first indictments before the end of the year. Mr. Zacklin briefed the Security Council on the proposed court on Tuesday. Today, he discussed some of the details.
The new court, he said, would enlist judges and lawyers in Sierra Leone as well as prominent jurists from outside the country. Secretary General Kofi Annan would appoint a majority of judges; the Sierra Leonean government would select the other judges and the chief prosecutor. The court in Sierra Leone would have a single trial chamber with three judges, two of them foreign. The appeals chamber would have five judges, three of them foreign. In a report last week to the Security Council, Mr. Annan said the United Nations mission in Sierra Leone, through its human rights section, was in a position to provide evidence of abuses to the prosecutor.
Three weeks ago, the Bush administration's war crimes ambassador, Pierre-Richard Prosper, criticized the tribunals for the Balkans and Rwanda, suggesting they were flawed by unprofessionalism and mismanagement. United Nations officials and other legal experts disputed Mr. Prosper's characterization. The tribunals for Rwanda and the Balkans have annual budgets of $100 million. The Sierra Leone special court, with a smaller staff, would get only $60 million over three years, financed by 15 to 20 countries, including the United States, Britain and the Netherlands. ''A lot of states are looking at the special court to see if this kind of court can work and if it can be leaner'' than the other tribunals, Mr. Zacklin said. He cited Cambodia, which has yet to bring to justice the Khmer Rouge officials who oversaw the killings of more than a million Cambodian civilians. ''I have no doubt whatsoever that the Cambodians are looking at what is happening in Sierra Leone,'' Mr. Zacklin said.
The defendants in Sierra Leone would include the likes of Foday Sankoh, a former army sergeant who headed the Revolutionary United Front. His insurgent group inspired terror by hacking off limbs of thousands of civilians, raping women and forcing children to fight. Some former rebels contend that government soldiers also committed atrocities and should be brought to account. The court is deemed essential for Sierra Leone's return to relative normality. With elections planned for May 14, the government has lifted the state of emergency to allow campaigning by political parties.
The United Nations had 17,400 troops deployed in Sierra Leone as of Jan. 31, making it the largest peacekeeping mission. Mr. Annan asked the Security Council to extend the mission's mandate, which expires at the end of this month, until Sept. 30. The secretary general said in his report that more than 47,000 combatants in Sierra Leone have put aside their weapons.
Source: New York Times
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