To most people’s surprise, Britain’s new and very dull Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett announced on June 15 that the United Kingdom had agreed to imprison Charles Taylor, Liberia’s former president, if he were to be found guilty by the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague.
Before explaining the international aspects of this case, British newspapers could not resist pointing out that Britain’s prisons are already seriously overcrowded, and that recently the Home Office released a number of foreign prisoners without making any effort to send them back to the countries they had come from.
Some years ago I was shown around the top security block in Belmarsh Prison, in South East London. This is where Charles Taylor would be imprisoned. The block was constructed with senior IRA prisoners and international drug dealers in mind, and it certainly looked to be extremely secure. The cells were small with a tiny window overlooking the rooftops. I should hate to have to spend a single day in one of them.
There is a considerable story behind Charles Taylor’s case, and for years it was assumed he would never be brought before a court — like so many other African warlords. In 2003 he was indicted by the Special Court for Sierra Leone, which was created by the United Nations for war crimes and other serious breaches of international law, carried out during the 11-year civil war in Sierra Leone. It will be remembered that this war was exceptionally brutal and the rebels resorted to cutting off the limbs of men, women and children as a method of intimidating the population.
Charles Taylor was removed from power in August 2003. He was given refuge in Nigeria by President Olusegun Obasanjo where he lived in considerable comfort. But in March of this year Obasanjo agreed to extradite him to Liberia. The global community had been scandalized by Charles Taylor’s favorable treatment, and the Nigerian president came under considerable diplomatic pressure.
Charles Taylor had advanced warning that he was going to be kicked out and he attempted to escape over the Nigerian border. It was thought he was trying to get to Libya. He was caught and flown to Sierra Leone.
On his arrival in Freetown he found that nine commanders of rebel and pro-government militias had already appeared before the Special Court. The court began to feel it had too much on its plate. Charles Taylor still has his admirers in West Africa, especially in Liberia. Might his presence lead to instability in this war-weary region? Sensibly the court contacted the Dutch government to request that the trial of Charles Taylor be moved to The Hague, and the Dutch government agreed. However, The Hague is a far more expensive venue. Who is going to pay the difference? It is not yet clear. Will Charles Taylor’s victims and the relations still be able to attend the trial? The Dutch government, fully aware of the responsibilities that flow from having the ICC and the international tribunal for former Yugoslavia on its soil, but sensing some obvious problems, agreed only on two conditions being met. The Security Council should formally authorize the transfer of Charles Taylor, and after the trial, whether guilty and sentenced or not, another country would take him in.
At first no country was prepared to step into the breach. Finally the United Kingdom, possibly after some strong lobbying by the United Nations, announced it would give him a prison cell if convicted. Should he not be convicted by the court it would be a matter for the Dutch government and the United Nations to find him a new home.
I strongly back this move by the Foreign Office in London, which could cost its budget some 75,00 pounds a year if Charles Taylor is put in prison in Britain. Britain had responsibilities for Sierra Leone from 1808, when a settlement for liberated and escaped slaves on the Freetown Peninsula was declared a crown colony, to 1961 when Sierra Leone became a fully independent state within the Commonwealth.
Britain is rightly proud of the part it played in helping to bring the civil war in Sierra Leone to an end, and the courage and professionalism of its servicemen in that country.
I am conscious of the reservations there are in the Arab world over the role of the ICC. In some quarters it is seen as American or Western imposed international justice that is alien to Muslim traditions. But in Rome in 1998 the United States and Israel opposed the court; 120 other nations backed it. I would claim it is in the interests of the people in every country that those accused of despicable and horrifying war crimes should be brought to justice without delay — and I include Charles Taylor now safely in The Hague.
