Liberia a 'triumph for Africa'
2003-08-12 16:51
Johannesburg - The exile of Liberian former president Charles Taylor was hailed by a South African newspaper on Tuesday as a sign that African leaders were willing to hold their peers accountable for misrule.
It came as the heads of state of the African Union's 50 nations planned a peace and security council along United Nations security council lines.
This would enable the AU to be able to call on African contingents to intervene in states where crimes against humanity were being committed.
The New Partnership for Africa's Development, hailed as an economic recovery programme for what President Thabo Mbeki describes as an "African renaissance", also contains a "peer review mechanism" under which countries will volunteer to have their records assessed.
In Johannesburg, Business Day newspaper declared in an editorial: "For African diplomats, the big story was that tenacious traditions of non-interference are yielding to collective action against a sovereign deemed unfit to govern his state."
"Taylor's resignation reveals a new willingness among African leaders to hold their peers accountable for misrule," it said.
Accused of blasphemy
The paper said South Africa should press for the removal of Taylor's "successor and crony" Moses Blah, who moved from vice-president to president on Monday as Taylor handed over power, then flew to exile in a luxurious mansion in Calabar, in the southeast of Nigeria.
In Lagos, the Sun newspaper accused Taylor of blasphemy in declaring "I am like Jesus... I'll be back."
In Ivory Coast, Fraternite-Matin newspaper declared that Taylor, who was elected president in 1997 after a brutal eight-year civil war, "went as he arrived - amid blood and tears".
United States President George W Bush described Taylor's departure as "an important step toward a better future for the Liberian people".
"The United States will work with the Liberian people and with the international community to achieve a lasting peace after more than a decade of turmoil and suffering," he pledged in Denver, Colorado.
Meanwhile, the US commander in Liberia, General Thomas Turner, flew in to Monrovia to try to open its rebel-held port to shipments of food and humanitarian aid.
Troops being pledged as peacekeepers
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan "hopes that this development may at last mark the beginning of the end of the long nightmare of the Liberian people", said his spokesperson Fred Eckhard.
"He also urges all member states to give whatever assistance they can to the Liberian people in restoring security and stability, notably by supporting and contributing to the multinational force authorised by the Security Council."
Bangladesh, Namibia and Pakistan have already pledged troops to that force, and South Africa is also considering sending troops. The UN force will take over from a west African force spearheaded by Nigerian troops.
A spokesman for the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, said Taylor's departure was "a decision that seems to go in the right direction to stop the violence and reach a solution for Liberia".
In neighbouring Sierra Leone, residents of Freetown broke into spontaneous cheers on Monday as Taylor stepped down.
Taylor, a former rebel warlord, has been indicted by a UN-backed court in Sierra Leone for allegedly supporting the Revolutionary United Front there, known for having led a brutal campaign that including rampant and indiscriminate murder, rape and mutilation.
The US-based Human Rights Watch called on Nigerian authorities to hand Taylor over to that court, noting that he was accused of "the most heinous of abuses".
However, Nigerian officials have said they will not negotiate over the charges and will not accept any "harassment" from the international community about his asylum, which they say was granted on humantarian grounds.