Charles Taylor pleads for ‘reconciliation, not retribution’ from war crimes court

Convicted war criminal and former Liberian president Charles Taylor said during his sentencing hearing yesterday that he sympathised with victims of the civil war in Sierra Leone he helped foment, and asked judges to pass sentence against him in a spirit of “reconciliation, not retribution”.

In a ruling last month, judges at the Special Court for Sierra Leone found Taylor guilty of 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including murder, rape and conscripting child soldiers. Judges at the UN-backed court said his aid was essential in helping rebels in Sierra Leone continue their bloody rampage during its decade-long civil war, which ended in 2002 with more than 50,000 dead.

Taylor is due to be sentenced on 30 May, with prosecutors demanding an 80-year prison term. Taylor said: “I express my sadness and deepest sympathy for the atrocities and crimes that were suffered by individuals and families in Sierra Leone.”

He insisted his actions aimed to help stabilise the region and claimed he never knowingly assisted in crimes.

He said: “What I did was done with honour. I was convinced that unless there was peace in Sierra Leone, Liberia would not be able to move forward.”

Judges found Taylor helped the rebels obtain weapons in full knowledge they would likely be used to commit terrible crimes, in exchange for payments of “blood diamonds”.

Defence lawyer Courtenay Griffiths said Taylor’s conviction had been “trumpeted as sending an unequivocal message to world leaders that holding office confers no immunity”. But the reality was that while many western countries had funded militias that committed atrocities, no western leader had ever been indicted by a war crimes tribunal, he said.