Nigeria won't hand over Taylor
2005-07-21 10:06
New York - Nigeria will not hand over ousted Liberian President Charles Taylor to a third country but would consider returning him to Liberia, Nigeria's foreign minister said on Wednesday.
Nigeria has come under increasing pressure - including from the United Nations human rights chief and the United States - to send Taylor to a UN-backed war crimes court in Freetown, Sierra Leone, where he has been charged with supporting notoriously brutal rebels in the country's 1991 to 2002 civil war.
A one-time warlord, Taylor launched a 1989 to 1996 insurgency in Liberia before winning presidential elections in 1997. He fled a rebel assault in August 2003 and took political asylum in Nigeria.
Asked whether Nigeria was giving serious thought to handing Taylor over to the Sierra Leone tribunal, foreign minister Oluyemi Adeniji said "no".
Nigeria will give "very, very, very serious and sympathetic consideration" to a request from a democratically elected government in Liberia for Taylor to be repatriated, "but not to a third country", said Adeniji.
- AP