Taylor pleads not guilty

2006-04-03 18:27

Freetown - Former Liberian president Charles Taylor pleaded not guilty on Monday to war crimes and crimes against humanity, including sexual slavery, mutilation and sending children into combat.

Taylor at first told the international war crimes court he could not plead because he did not recognise the court's right to try him.

But he went on to say he was not guilty, telling Justice Richard Lussick "I did not and could not have" committed the atrocities that allegedly occurred during Sierra Leone's civil war. The court accepted his comment as a formal plea.

Taylor, wearing a dark suit and maroon tie, spoke calmly and slowly.

Many hope the trial of Taylor, the first former African president to face such charges, will firmly establish the principle that Africa's despots are not above the law.

Taylor was once feared across the region for fomenting violence in his homeland, in Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast and elsewhere.

Security was tight at the special court in Sierra Leone, the country to which Taylor is accused of exporting his own civil war.

Taylor, and court officials who received death threats, will be protected by bulletproof glass and dozens of UN peacekeepers from Mongolia and Ireland.

Eleven counts of war crimes

Before Monday's arraignment, a black, four-wheel-drive vehicle with tinted windows, believed to be carrying Taylor, had been driven from the detention area across the court complex toward the hearing chamber. UN troops stood guard and a white, armored UN vehicle blocked an access road.

Taylor faces 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including sexual slavery, mutilation and sending children into combat, in connection with alleged backing of Sierra Leonean rebels. He has repeatedly declared he is innocent.

He is to be judged by the international tribunal established to try those seen as bearing greatest responsibility for atrocities during Sierra Leone's 1991-2002 civil war.

A Liberian lawyer had said the defence strategy would be to argue that the Sierra Leone court had no jurisdiction over Liberia or its head of state and so had no right to try Taylor, who was president when he was indicted in 2003.

The court's appeals chamber had rejected a similar argument made soon after the indictment was filed.

- AP