(Reuters) – A United Nations-backed court convicted former Liberian
president Charles Taylor of war crimes on Thursday, the first time an African head of state has been found guilty by an
international tribunal.
President Charles Taylor looks down as he waits for the start of a hearing to receive a verdict in a court room of the
Special Court for Sierra Leone in Leidschendam, near The Hague, April 26, 2012. REUTERS/Peter Dejong/Pool
Taylor, 64, was charged with 11 counts of murder, rape, conscripting child
soldiers and sexual slavery during intertwined wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone, during which more than 50,000 people were
killed.
They took more than two hours to read out the charges, evidence and its final ruling.
“The accused is
criminally responsible … for aiding and abetting in the crimes in counts one to eleven,” Presiding Judge Richard Lussick
said as he read out the court’s decision, although he said Taylor was not guilty of senior criminal
responsibility.
Taylor, wearing a dark blue suit and maroon tie, looked calm and subdued as he stood up before the
court to hear the verdict.
The first African leader to stand trial for war crimes, Taylor was accused of directing
Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels in a campaign of terror to plunder Sierra Leone’s diamond mines for profit and
weapons trading.
Taylor denied the charges, insisting he tried to bring peace to the region and arguing his trial was
a politically motivated conspiracy by Western nations.
(Reporting by Sara Webb and Anthony Deutsch;
Editing by Alison Williams
and Giles Elgood)