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Moving Taylor from Sierra Leone could take weeks

Posted on: Sunday, 2 April 2006, 08:09 CDT

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.

Source: REUTERS

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