Taylor on presidential jet
2006-03-29 15:41
Kano - A Nigerian presidential jet took off on Wednesday carrying former Liberian leader Charles Taylor home to Monrovia, witnesses and officials said.
Local reporter Abdullahi Bego told AFP that he had seen Taylor escorted on board the jet at the airport in the northern city of Maiduguri.
Airport staff and a senior police officer in Abuja said that the jet was bound for Liberia.
The plane took off at around 13:30, Bego said.
The United Nations Security Council has adopted a resolution allowing peacekeepers in Liberia to detain Taylor once he arrives in Monrovia and to transport him to Sierra Leone, where international prosecutors want to try him for war crimes.
According to Nigeria's Information Minister Frank Nweke, Obasanjo has ordered Taylor's immediate repatriation to Liberia, following the former warlord's disappearance from his Nigerian home in exile and subsequent arrest.
- AFP