Liberia urged to hand over key fugitives

The prosecutor of Sierra Leone's UN-backed Special Court, set up to try serious crimes committed during a decade of civil war, urged Liberian President Charles Taylor on Friday to hand over two key figures who are due to face trial. David Crane confirmed that investigations had led the Court to believe that Johnny Paul Koroma, who led a military coup in 1997, and Sam Bockarie, a former leader of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), a defeated rebel movement, had both sought refuge in Liberia. He noted that Taylor had promised to hand over the two fugitives, should they be detected in Liberia by his government and said the Sierra Leonean court would "follow the evidence wherever it leads." On Thursday, the Court's chief investigator Alan White said he had received credible information that Koroma and Bockarie were both in Liberia. He appealed to Taylor to arrest the two and turn them over to the Court. "If President Taylor refuses to turn over these people to the Special Court and we have direct knowledge that he is aiding and abetting these two indicted war criminals, Charles Taylor could be charged with obstruction of justice in terms of the Special Court for Sierra Leone," White told the BBC. Taylor's press secretary, Vani Passawe, pledged that if Koroma and Bockarie were found in Liberia they would be handed over. "Sam Bockarie and Johnny Paul Koroma will find Liberia unwelcoming," he said. Passawe noted that Bockarie had been expelled from the country some years ago. Bockarie and Koroma were indicted by the Special Court in early March along with five others who have since been arrested. Earlier this week, Cote d'Ivoire's main rebel movement, the Patriotic Movement of Cote d'Ivoire (MPCI) accused Bockarie of murdering Felix Doh, the commander of the Movement for Justice and Peace (MJP), a smaller rebel force that operates close to the Liberian border in the west of the country. Reports from the area indicated that Sierra Leonean as well Liberian mercenaries have been fighting alongside the MJP. After leading a coup against Sierra Leone's current elected president Ahmad Tejan Kabbah in 1997, Koroma tried to bring the RUF, of which Bockarie was one of the main military commanders, into government. Koroma was subsequently overthrown with the help of an international intervention force and Sierra Leone was returned to civilian rule. The charges against Koroma and Bockarie range from murder, sexual slavery and rape, to the forced conscription of children and attacks on United Nations peacekeepers. The Special Court, created through an agreement between the UN and the government of Sierra Leone, is mandated to try those who bear the greatest responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity during the civil war. It concentrates on crimes that took place after 30 November 1996.