Liberia Takes Steps to Peace as Pressure Mounts on Taylor

06/08/2003| IslamWeb

Liberia's war-ravaged capital Monrovia took its first tentative steps towards peace Tuesday, but confusion surrounded the fate of President Charles Taylor who has pledged to step down in less than a week. Humanitarian aid supplies were stepped up as a west African peacekeeping force grew in strength, while aid workers and journalists were able for the first time to cross the bridges linking the government-held town centre and the rebel-controlled districts around Monrovia's main seaport. South African President Thabo Mbeki and a spokesman for Taylor said the former warlord would go into exile in Nigeria after handing over power next Monday to his vice-president Moses Blah. But a senior aide to President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria, which is providing the first peacekeeping troops to the west African state, said Taylor now appeared unwilling to seek asylum there. West African and international mediators still have much to do to secure a political solution in the country which has been wracked for the past four years by the latest bout of civil war. A 300-strong Nigerian advance force landed at Robertsfield Airport on Monday with a mission to end the fighting between Taylor's forces and the main rebel group, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD). Their arrival coincided with a lull in the fierce fighting which has seen hundreds of civilians killed or injured, and more than 250,000 forced to flee their homes for run-down refugee centres. The Nigerian commander of the west African force, General Festus Okonkwo, and US ambassador John Blaney on Tuesday met Taylor's defence minister Daniel Chea, and held their first talks with rebel leaders. The force does not yet have enough men in place to venture into the city, although the cheering civilians who chanted "no more war" along the roads in the rebel-held suburb of Via Town were optimistic that peace was coming. Jordi Raigh, deputy head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) mission, said the reopening of the bridges would allow aid workers to begin supplying previously inaccessible parts of the city. "Currently we are widening our radius of action," he said. "Today is maybe the first day that things have changed. There are many more people out on the street." Officers from the Nigerian-led peace force were to venture into the rebel-controlled zone later Tuesday to discuss terms for their deployment and in particular to seek to take control of the port. "We hope that since peacekeepers are being deployed and are being apparently quite well received in Monrovia, that in the coming days the aid agencies will be able to go back into at least Monrovia," said Kris Janowski, a spokesman for the UN refugee agency in Geneva. The United Nations was preparing to boost an emergency appeal for funding from donors in New York on Wednesday to help the Liberia aid effort, said a spokeswoman for the UN humanitarian coordinator. In Pretoria, Mbeki told reporters he had received assurances from Taylor on Monday that he would leave Liberia, a key demand of west African leaders and the United States to restore peace. "The vice president will form a government of national unity and he (Taylor) will leave after the installation of the vice president as president. He will do this as soon as possible -- either the same day or the day after -- to go to Nigeria," he said. But Stanley Macebu, a top aide to Obasanjo, told journalists in Lagos: "The latest information that we have is that Mr Taylor appears to be at the present time, unwilling to take us upon our offer (of asylum). "It appears he is imposing fresh conditions. That matter will obviously have to be looked into," he said. Taylor's spokesman said the former warlord who sparked a civil war in 1989 and was elected president in 1997 expected to be shielded from war crimes prosecution if he takes up exile in Nigeria. Vaanii Paasewe told AFP that Taylor had agreed to go into exile in Nigeria but declined to reveal the date "for security reasons". Taylor is wanted for trial by a UN-backed tribunal in neighbouring Sierra Leone for atrocities perpetrated during its own 10-year civil war. In Washington, the White House and the US State Department said Taylor should leave Liberia and face the charges to secure progress in the peace process. Liberian rebels vowed to fight on "till the last man drops" if Taylor fails to leave the country as promised, a rebel leader said Tuesday. "Even if Taylor resigns but does not leave, we will not disarm. After Monday if he refuses to go we will fight him till the last man drops," said LURD's Sekou Fofana. **PHOTO CAPTION*** Liberian rebel chief of staff Major General Abdullah Seyea Sheriff August 5, 2003. (REUTERS/Juda Ngwenya)