Rights group tells government to produce Teahjay

A human rights group in Monrovia has called on the Liberian government to “produce the living body” of former deputy information minister Milton Teahjay, who has been missing for a week, PANA reported, quoting a statement by the organisation. The human rights monitor of the United Methodist Church said “inconsistent utterances” of admission and denial about the arrest or non-arrest of Teahjay shifted the “burden” of establishing the former minister’s whereabouts onto the government. Teahjay disappeared last Friday after reports that he tried to leave the country with his brother but was turned back by immigration officials in northern Liberia. Since then there has been much speculation over his fate, fuelled by apparently conflicting information from the state. President Charles Taylor, on his return from Taiwan, announced the arrest of someone who had been causing problems for the government. However the chief of police, Paul Mulbah, denied that Teahjay had been arrested and said he was not wanted by the authorities. Teahjay lost his cabinet post last year. He was sacked last month from his appointment as media consultant to Taylor after organising demonstrations against a logging company accused of stripping forests and neglecting development in his home county of Sinoe.