Human rights advocates working on transitional justice and human trafficking in Liberia say they are shocked by this week’s announcement by Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State, that the US government will shut down the Office of Global Criminal Justice and the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, both of which have played significant roles in Liberia in recent years.
By Anthony Stephens, Senior Justice Correspondent with New Narratives
The cuts were part of what Mr. Rubio called a “drastic” overhaul to the State Department saying the government’s diplomatic agency was “bloated, bureaucratic” and “beholden to radical political ideology.”
The Office of Global Criminal Justice, headed by Ambassador Beth Van Schaack under the previous Biden administration, provided extensive advice and technical support to Liberia’s transitional justice process. She had also promised funding for the War and Economics Crimes Court which experts said would cost at least $US10 million. President Donald Trump cancelled most of the $70 billion in annual funding from the US Agency for International Development in March, but justice experts were hopeful that the Office of Global Justice, which was housed under the State Department, might have escaped the cuts.
That hope will be all but dead now. Without US support, many advocates fear Liberia’s court will not proceed unless the Liberian government makes a major commitment.
“It will undermine Liberia’s quest for justice work,” said Mr. Adama Dempster, a leading Liberian human rights advocate, by WhatsApp text messages. “It will further create room for alleged perpetrators to not be held accountable for their actions. Victims and survivors of war crimes atrocities will lose hope that those who created their victimization will not be held accountable.”
Before the US aid cuts, experts had predicted that Liberia’s war and economic crimes court
would cost between $US10-$60 million. The US was supposed to provide a significant portion of that money. The aid cuts now leave the European Union and Swedish government as the most likely major funders of the court and Liberia’s transitional justice process overall.
Dr. Jallah Barbu, executive director of the Office of the War and Economics Crimes Court, said he was talking to all potential donors.
“The Office certainly looks forward to support from every friendly country and every international partner that believes in justice and rule of law.…. the US, the EU, whoever else it is,” said Dr. Barbu in a phone interview. “This office really looks forward to assistance, whether technical, whether financial, moral.”
The Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons has also played a lead role in Liberia’s efforts to stamp out human trafficking. It has funded the training of Liberian investigators, law enforcement personnel, prosecutors, judges, lawyers, and the civil society— initiatives that have been pivotal to Liberia’s antihuman trafficking program. Cllr. Cooper Kruah, Liberia’s labor minister, did not respond to a request for comment on the proposed US cut to trafficking funding. But in a phone interview to FrontPage Africa/New Narratives, Mr. Adolphus Satiah, the former head of the antihuman trafficking secretariat at the ministry, said cancelling support to human trafficking in Liberia will have severe consequences for the country and thousands of trafficking victims.
“It’s scary. It’s not a good sign for Liberia,” said Mr. Satiah. “Our government does not have the capacity to fully support antitrafficking programs in Liberia.”
Last June, Liberia was downgraded to tier 2 watchlist in the US annual trafficking in persons report, a decline in what experts said was a good performance in the previous two years. In 2023 the Weah government was widely celebrated for taking the unprecedented action of bringing home hundreds of women trapped in a trafficking ring in the Middle Eastern country of Oman. The Weah government had budgeted $230,000 in 2023 for anti-trafficking efforts before diverting 90 percent of that budget, allegedly to election activities.
The Boakai government’s funding to human trafficking has drastically declined. Despite repeated assurances of more funding to the national human trafficking program, only $US40,000 has been allocated to the anti-human traficking unit at the Labor Ministry in the country’s 2025 national budget.
The government has forged partnerships with some institutions fighting human trafficking, creating awareness campaigns and holding meetings with stakeholders to evaluate the country’s national action on human trafficking. But the government lost the only case it has prosecuted in nearly a year.
Experts had warned that Liberia could be downgraded to tier 3 because of its poor performance and risk aid cuts. Given the Trump administration’s decimation of foreign aid and now the elimination of the Office in charge of monitoring trafficking in persons, it’s not clear which if any international organization will now be pressuring the government to act
Mr. Satiah urged the government to support its own antihuman trafficking program by putting “adequate funding in the budget to be able to fight human trafficking all by ourselves.”
This story is a collaboration with New Narratives as part of the West Africa Justice Reporting Project. Funding was provided by the Swedish Embassy in Liberia which had no say in the story’s content.
