Taylor renews pledge to go
2003-07-26 21:41
Monrovia, Liberia - President Charles Taylor on Saturday urged international peacekeepers to hurry to Liberia, and renewed pledges to step down when they arrive.
US President George W Bush, who has ordered US troops to Liberia's coast to support a promised West African peace force, repeatedly has demanded warlord-turned-president Taylor cede power as part of any peace deal.
"Let nobody have any concern about, 'Will President Taylor step down?"' Taylor, who has repeatedly reneged on just that pledge, told a prayer rally in Monrovia's leading sports stadium. "I will step down."
"For one man, Charles Taylor, Liberia cannot die," Taylor added.
He thanked the international community for its promise of peacekeepers to stop Liberia's 3-year-old war, which is now laying ruin to the capital as rebels drive home their battle to oust Taylor.
"I hope they can come sooner, and not later," Taylor said of peacekeepers.
Nigerian offer
The Liberian leader, who says he will accept a Nigerian offer of safe haven when he quits, said either his vice president or speaker of the house would succeed him.
Taylor and his aides have made repeated promises of his departure since June, when rebels launched the first of what are now three waves of attacks on refugee-crowded Monrovia.
The attacks, the latest of them a week-old, have killed hundreds of civilians.
Taylor's speech came on what clerics and government officials called a national day of prayer and fasting for war-devastated Liberia.
He spoke to a dignitary-filled crowd of 5 000 in the stands, while 30 000 refugees from the rebel siege swarmed under the bleachers - their only shelter against attacks.
"I'm so sorry," Taylor said of the suffering of the refugees in the stadium, where hunger and epidemics are running rampant.
But he insisted Monrovia was safer with him than without him, until peacekeepers arrive. "If I were not here, there would be bodies all over the streets."
The biggest roar from the crowd came when Taylor, a former warlord behind 14 years of conflict in Liberia, called for an end to fighting.
"I wish you two things: Liberians will live and not die, and that peace comes," he said. -AP
- AP