Moving Taylor from Sierra Leone could take weeks

By Nick Tattersall

FREETOWN (Reuters) – Moving Africa’s most notorious war
crimes suspect, Charles Taylor, from Sierra Leone to stand
trial in The Hague is likely to take several weeks at least,
court officials and diplomats say.

The former Liberian President is due to appear in Sierra
Leone’s U.N.-backed Special Court on Monday, when he is
expected to plead not guilty to 11 indictments for atrocities
committed during the former British colony’s 1991-2002 civil
war.

But fears the former warlord’s presence could undermine
stability in the volatile West African region where he still
has pockets of support have led the court to ask the
Netherlands if it could host the main body of the trial in The
Hague.

“Sierra Leone has gone through a very nasty war, Liberia
has gone through an equally nasty war. Guinea has problems,
Ivory Coast has some problems,” Sierra Leone’s Information
Minister, Septimus Kaikai, told Reuters.

“The trauma that people went through in this country, they
are still going through, both psychological and otherwise. If
there is the perception that there is a slight possibility that
that might take place again, prevention is better than cure.”

Britain circulated a U.N. Security Council resolution on
Friday that would authorize Taylor’s transfer to the
Netherlands, and is expected to be adopted early next week.

But court officials say the resolution is only one
condition for Taylor’s transfer and other measures, including
ensuring security and other facilities in The Hague, could take
time.

“It will not be next week. It will take several weeks at
least,” one senior court official, who declined to be
identified, told Reuters.

TIGHT SECURITY

Moving Taylor’s trial to The Hague is likely to be
expensive and complicated for the Special Court, which was
originally set up in Sierra Leone on the request of the
government.

The prosecution would have to decide whether to fly
witnesses to Europe, many of them villagers who have never even
visited the capital and who would need interpreters to
translate from at least six local languages, court officials
said.

Many Sierra Leoneans were overjoyed when they saw Taylor
helicoptered in to the Special Court on Wednesday after almost
three years exile in Calabar, Nigeria. He was arrested trying
to cross the border to Cameroon.

But they also want him gone again quickly to face justice
elsewhere, fearing his presence could trigger more unrest — a
concern also felt in neighboring countries like Liberia where
some of his supporters have threatened violence if he is tried.

Sierra Leonean armed police patrol the barbed wire
perimeter fence around the compound where Taylor is being held
and a rapid reaction force of Irish and Swedish U.N. soldiers
are on standby to back up the Mongolian U.N. force guarding the
court.

Diplomats say that should guarantee security for now, but
they say the risk becomes higher the longer Taylor remains.

“The problem with Freetown is that it sits in a region with
porous borders. It would be easy for his sympathizers to get in
and they would be hard to track down,” said one senior diplomat
in Freetown.

“The biggest fear in the region is a short, sharp operation
to spring him. If he came in by helicopter, he can get out
again by helicopter,” the diplomat said.