By Anthony Stephens, New Narratives Senior Justice Reporter

United Kingdom police have arrested and detained a man in his 40s on war crimes charges for his alleged role in the Liberian civil war in the 1990s and early 2000s.

The arrest of the man, whose name is being withheld by UK Metropolitan police, “follows a referral made to the Met’s War Crimes Team in January 2021 and relates to alleged war crimes committed during the Liberian Civil War in the 1990s and early 2000s,” according to a statement on the website of the Metropolitan Police.

A house in the area of Newcastle, a city in England’s northeast, was searched by officers from UK Counter Terrorism Policing North East unit as part of the investigation into the man. The arrest followed a referral to the Met Police’s war crimes team in January last year.

Justice activist Hassan Billity of the Global Justice Research Group, which has played a key role in the cases against nearly a dozen accused war criminals in Europe and US, declined to comment on the arrest until the police released a name.

The arrest comes two years after the Metropolitan Police charged Jankuba Fofana, a former frontline commander of a rebel group, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy. Now 47, Fofana, was accused by rights activists of ordering the Gbarma Massacre in Gbarpolu County in which 110 people were murdered. He was released by British police shortly after his arrest. The case is still awaiting a trial date. UK courts were slowed by the Covid pandemic.

Like Fofana, the unnamed man is being held “on suspicion of offences contrary to Section 51 of the International Criminal Court Act 2001”. The section covers genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. It applies to anyone who committed these acts in the UK or a UK national or resident who allegedly commits any of those crimes outside the United Kingdom.

Agnes Reeves Taylor, former wife of Charles Taylor and leader of his National Patriotic Front for Liberia, was charged with torture and conspiracy to commit torture during the Liberian civil wars by UK police in 2017. She was held in detention for two and a half years before the case was dismissed on technical grounds. The UK Home Office found there were serious reasons to consider that she had committed a crime against peace, a war crime, or a crime against humanity and revoked her asylum claim. Taylor returned to Liberia soon after. She has denied all charges against her.

The arrest comes as justice activists await the trial of Kunti K., a former Liberian commander of the United Liberation Movement of Liberia for Democracy, which is set to begin on October 10 in Paris, France where he will be tried for war crimes and crimes against humanity allegedly committed during the First Liberian Civil War between 1989 and 1996.

This story was a collaboration with New Narratives as part of the West Africa Justice Reporting Project.

Monrovia – Agnes Reeves Taylor, ex-wife of former Liberian President Charles Taylor has been denied bail ahead of a war crime related trial slated for October 2018.

Report by Al-Varney Rogers al.rogers@frontpageafricaonline.com

She will remain in custody until the trial begins.

It can be recalled, that Reeves Taylor was arrested by the Metropolitan Police’s war crimes unit on 1 June and now faces one count of conspiracy to commit torture under the Criminal Law Act 1977 and seven counts of torture under the Criminal Justice Act 1988.

Agnes Reeves Taylor, who has two daughters and a granddaughter living in the UK, appeared at the Old Bailey by video link from prison for a short administrative hearing. Her trial is due to start on 2 October 2018.

The conspiracy charge alleges that she ‘agreed with others unknown that a course of conduct would be pursued namely rape’, which if carried out would amount to torture.

Three torture charges relate to the intentional infliction of severe pain or suffering on a 13 year-old boy.

The other four torture charges relate to a child, two named individuals and a female referred to as ‘the pastor’s wife’.

Agnes Taylor was charged with two counts of being involved in torture in Gbarnga, in the north of the country, and one count of the same in Gborplay, in its north-east.

Each charge was brought under section 134(1) of Britain’s Criminal Justice Act 1988. She was also charged with planning to carry out torture between 23 December 1989 and 1 January 1991 under section 1(1) of the Criminal Law Act 1977.

Taylor, who led the National Patriotic Front of Liberia, was convicted of aiding and abetting rebels who committed atrocities in Sierra Leone and sentenced to 50 years in prison on 30 May 2012.

Following a peace agreement Taylor was elected as President of Liberia in 1997 but a second civil war broke out in 1999 and Taylor was forced into exile in 2003.

Charles Taylor was jailed for 50 years in 2012 for war crimes after a UN-backed tribunal in The Hague. A year later, the Ministry of Justice confirmed he would serve the sentence in a British prison.

Agnes Taylor has worked as a lecturer at Coventry University and acting head of department at the London annex of the University of Coventry on a £44,000 salary since 2012.

Gbarnga served as the headquarters of Charles Taylor’s National Patriotic Front during the first Liberian civil war.

A final peace agreement led to the election of Taylor as President of Liberia in 1997. A second civil war broke out in 1999 and Taylor was forced into exile in 2003.

Like Agnes Reeves Taylor Former Defense Minister of Charles Taylor’s National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), Mr. Thomas Woewiyu’s criminal case has been assigned for Monday, February 26, 2018 by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Recently a U.S. jury has convicted ex-Liberian warlord Mohammed Jabateh also known as Gen. Jungle Jabbah on all four federal immigration fraud and perjury charges finding that he lied when he claimed on asylum applications that he had not committed war crimes.

JUSTICE MAY BE DELAYED but sometimes never denied, and no matter how perpetrators feel protected that day will surely come, no matter how long, it will come – they will either be punished by a legal system of their own, others or the nature of karma.

AND THOSE WHO IGNORE the heinous crimes that caused the death of tens of thousands of innocent Liberians and foreigners during the war are equivalently slitting the throats of hundreds of those very victims – some of whom ghosts are wandering, weeping and craving justice.

THE DAY OF RECKONING is inevitable for gruesome murders who are masquerading as some of the most privilege Liberians at the echelon of power in the society. Investigating all perpetrators of the senseless killings no matter their social status is the least those lost souls are hankering because impunity serves a purpose of reoccurrence especially when wounds are not properly nursed. 

THE RECENT ARREST OF AGNES Reeves Taylor, former wife of jailed Liberian leader Charles Taylor, in London, England sent shock waves to many Liberians, amongst them some even more guilty them Madam Taylor. The message echoing from her arrest after many years in exile and living glamorously is that: like opportunity, justice comes late too – and can also be served very cold from the refrigerator.

MADAM TAYLOR’S ARREST ADDS to the incarceration of Thomas Woewiyu, former defense minister of National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) rebel government based in the central Liberian city of Gbarnga, the arrest of NPFL’s Martina Johnson in Ghent, Belgium and the deportation of George Boley, rebel leader of the Liberia Peace Council (LPC), from the United States.

THIS IS ALSO A CAVEAT to other allege culprits of torture, massacre and rape who are roaming around Monrovia and other parts of the world – some of them even have the audacity to seek public office including the nations’ highest office.

THE GOVERNMENT OF LIBERIA has swept under-the-carpet the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s (TRC) recommendations in the name of peace, but there’s palpability of a political influence.

IT IS INDEED BAFFLING for an ordinary Liberian to see a government blatantly turning a blind eye on recommendations that have the propensity of dealing with impunity, serving as deterrent and opening a new chapter for a country far from recovering from the atrocities and destruction left by a brutal civil conflict.

WHEN MURDERES ARE VAUNTING about eluding justice only because of ‘peace sake’, social scientists would argue that such impunity affects the society as a whole and reignites a conspiracy theory that those indicted by the TRC are the very ones maneuvering to manipulate the system so they can continue savoring their ridiculously ill-fated social status at the detriment of grieving and traumatized families constrain to let sleeping dogs lie.

BUT WHILE THE GOVERNMEMT of Liberia is shamelessly looking the other way and tirelessly ridiculing the very TRC it endorsed based on the a peace agreement to end the second phase of the conflict, it is the United States and other European nations that are refusing to be apathetic. 

THE FEDERAL BEREAU of Investigation (FBI) is now probing the death of one of its citizens it believes was cold bloodily murdered by Senator Prince Johnson, during his barbaric and blood shedding war days as leader of one of the ruthless rebel forces – the Independent National Patriotic Front of Liberia (INPFL).

CONVERTED NOW AS PASTOR Prince Johnson, also Senator Johnson, and seeking the presidency this year, it is his INPFL that has gone down in history for atrociously and cannibal-likely murdering former President Samuel K. Doe – an account he detailed during his testimony at the TRC hearing but paradoxically, denied killing a single innocent person.

JOHNSON MAY HAVE BEEN pardoned by Liberians and voted senator twice as he enjoyed privileges like many other perpetrators of the war who holding top government positions, but the United States of America is not Liberia and won’t back down no matter the time and resources require.

 “THIS CASE HAS BEEN PENDING for a very long time now. The State of Michigan does not have any statute of limitation, therefore, a lot of people—even Johnson—may have forgotten about this incident but the State hasn’t. He will be prosecuted,” a source close to the FBI investigation of Johnson has told FrontPage Africa.

ACCORDING TO THE INVESTIGATION, the death squad, believed to be controlled by Johnson, during the morning hours of October 3, 1990 arrived at the Hare Krishna temple in Monrovia, ordered that all the devotees to come out. Seven devotees, five men and two women, exited the temple and filed into the waiting jeep. They were driven to Stockton Creek, where the devotees were forced out at gunpoint and herded onto the sand next to the river. The leader announced that only the men would be killed. Thus Hladini, a woman, knew she would not be killed.

ACCORDING TO REPORTS, as the leader [Johnson] raised his weapon to fire the first execution volley, Hladini leapt forward and attacked him with her bare hands. She shouted, “How dare you kill the devotees of Krishna? Better you kill me than kill them!” Hladini was the first to be shot.

KILLING AN AMERICAN IS the biggest mistake any warlord would make because the US government is not Liberia’s and because, unlike Liberia, it upholds the rule of law and love for liberty and most importantly there’s abundant resources to track you, apprehend you, lock you up for many years and throw away the keys. 

THIS IS HOW YOU DETER WOULD-BE perpetrators, and is this what we suggest is appropriate instead of covering the brushing aside the core issue thinking by closing your eyes and opening will make it go away – and that, it was just a nightmare.

TO REBUILD OUR COUNTRY into a civilized and modern society, no sin must go unpunished not to speak of crimes against humanity. When we ignored the wrongs of the past we encourage a culture of impunity allowing vices like arm robbery, rape, drug addiction, bribery and corruption to thrive on our reluctance to take action.

CRIMES AGAINST LIBERIANS must not go unpunished and individuals who are highly culpable regardless of their political, ethnic or religious affiliation must be made to pay no matter where that justice cometh. Liberians must remain hopeful and very aware that the only quintessence of peace is justice.  

Monrovia – The Metropolitan Police Service has finally charged Agnes Taylor, the wife of former Liberian President Charles Taylor with torture for her alleged involvement with atrocities committed by her former husband’s rebel group, the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), during the first Liberian Civil War.

On Thursday, British authorities announced that a 51-year-old Liberian woman had been arrested in East and Central London but did not reveal the woman’s identity.

A FrontPageAfrica investigation uncovered that it may have been Dr. Agnes Reeves-Taylor.

In a news release late Friday, the Geneva-based organization Civitas Maxima and the Monrovia-based Global Justice and Research Project (GJRP) announced that it provided the initial information to the UK authorities, which led to the Metropolitan Police Service commencing an investigation.

Charles Taylor, who brought civil war to Liberia with the NPFL invasion in 1989 and who was President of Liberia from 1997-2003, was convicted by the Special Court for Sierra Leone in 2012 for planning, aiding and abetting the commission by the rebels of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) of crimes such as acts of terrorism, murder and rape in Sierra Leone.

He is currently serving a 50-year sentence.

Charles Taylor, however, has never been held accountable for his crimes committed in Liberia because the Liberian authorities have made no effort to investigate and prosecute crimes committed over a decade of civil war that claimed well over 150 000 lives, most of whom were civilians.

This landmark case marks the second time someone formerly associated with the NPFL has been charged with crimes committed during Liberia’s civil wars.

The first case involved NPFL front line Commander Martina Johnson who was arrested in Belgium in September 2014 for her alleged role in wartime atrocities.

As partner organizations, Civitas Maxima and the GJRP document alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the Liberian civil wars and represent victims in their pursuit of justice.

This the fourth time since 2014 that the collaborative work between Civitas Maxima and its partners in Africa – GJRP in Liberia and the Centre of Accountability and Rule of Law (CARL) in Sierra Leone – has led to information being passed to European authorities resulting in the arrest of an alleged perpetrator of international crimes, with the first three arrests occurring in Switzerland and Belgium and the fourth now in the United Kingdom.

Monrovia – Cllr. Jerome Verdier, the former head of Liberia’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission says the search for justice will prevail following the confirmation Friday that the Metropolitan Police Service in the United Kingdom had finally charged Agnes Taylor, the wife of former Liberian President Charles Taylor with torture for her alleged involvement with atrocities committed by her former husband’s rebel group, the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), during the first Liberian Civil War.

In a reaction to the arrest and charge, Cllr. Verdier, in a statement to FrontPageAfrica said:

“The mysterious and elusive Agnes Reeves Taylor, ex-bush wife of former President Charles Taylor, is charged with war crimes and may appear in court tomorrow under the jurisdiction of a U.K. Court for her criminal role in the torture of her Liberian victims during the bloody war in Liberia.”

The former TRC boss averred that the arrest is the latest amongst several other arrests planned for the future to bring justice to the Country and thousands of war victims.

In order to bring closure and healing and reconciliation to our battered country, Cllr. Verdier said, the pursuit of justice will continue until the ghost of Liberia’s heinous past is exorcized and buried.

He added: “Amidst war crimes prosecution several other leads are been followed by investigators to conclude Harry Greave’s brutal murder investigations, as with Keith Judah’s and Cllr Michael Allison, amongst others who died in police custody.”

Cllr. Verdier is meanwhile calling on all peace-loving justice advocates to join him in commending the international justice systems and confidential witnesses and many persons of interests for efforts to bring perpetrators of war crimes and economic crimes committed against the peace-loving people of Liberia, during and before the war years and during the kleptomaniac years of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

“Justice will be pursued without fear or favor, and justice will prevail, so help us god!”

Cllr. Verdier’s TRC made several recommendations which are yet to be implemented. 

In recent years, several former figures of the civil war era who sought refuge in foreign countries have been arrested, charged and jail while some have been deported.

Among them are George Boley, the former leader of the Liberia Peace Council who was arrested, charged, tried, found guilty and deported to Liberia.

A U.S. Judge found sufficient evidence that that the former LPC leader had been involved in killings and recruited children to fight in the bloody civil war.

Martina Johnson, a commander of The National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) rebel group during Liberia’s first civil war, which took place from 1986 to 1996 was arrested last year in Belgium.

As a member of the NPFL, Johnson is suspected of having participated in and/or have been involved in many different crimes, including being suspected of participating in, or even having organised, “Operation Octopus”.

Octopus was the name given to the attack on the capital city of Monrovia carried out during October 1992 with the aim of getting Charles Taylor into power.

Five American nuns were killed during Operation Octopus.

These nuns were members of the “Adorers of the Blood of Christ” order – a Catholic order based in St Louis in the USA – who were acting as missionaries in Liberia but were also carrying out humanitarian work.

Johnson is suspected of being involved in their deaths.

Also last year, the United States Attorney in Philadelphia unsealed an indictment against 49-year-old East Lansdowne resident Mohammed Jabbateh, claiming that he was a Liberian war criminal known as “Jungle Jabbah.”

He faces fraud and perjury charges stemming from his immigration to the United States in the late 1990s.

Charles McArther Emmanuel, also known as Chuckie Taylor is the son of former President Taylor.

During his father’s presidency, Emmanuel became the commander of the infamously violent Anti-Terrorist Unit(ATU), commonly known in Liberia as the “Demon Forces”.

He is currently serving a 97-year sentence back in Florida for his role in human rights violation.

Last January, authorities in Canada denied Cindor Reeves, brother of Agnes Reeves Taylor eventhough he was instrumental in providing testimony that led to the indictment of former President Taylor.

He entered Taylor’s household as a teenager after Taylor married Reeves’s sister, Agnes.

He also helped Taylor smuggle guns and diamonds between Liberia and Sierra Leone. But Reeves secretly turned against Taylor and began co-operating with the Special Court for Sierra Leone, helping the international tribunal build its case against him.

Monrovia – Liberians residing in the United Kingdom were puzzled Thursday after a London war crimes team picked up a woman on suspicion of torturing people during the Liberian civil war nearly 30 years ago.

Both the Associated Press and BBC report that 51-year-old was held in custody over allegations relating to atrocities during the Liberian civil war between 1989 and 1993.

According to the report, British Metropolitan Police officers arrested the woman at an address in east London just after 7am this morning.

Charles Taylor’s National Patriotic Front (NPFL) has been accused of a wide range of human rights abuses and the large numbers of deaths during the conflict eventually led to the involvement of the UN and the Economic Community of West African States.

In March 2015, Mr. Taylor was ordered to serve the rest of his jail term in the UK, after losing a request to be transferred to Rwanda.

He had argued that he was being denied his rights to a family life, because his wife and children had not been granted UK visas.

The judges rejected this argument, saying they had not properly applied.A UN-backed court convicted him of war crimes over his support for rebels who committed atrocities in Sierra Leone.

An act of parliament was passed to allow for Taylor to serve his sentence in the UK, at the cost of the British government, following his conviction.

Mr. Taylor was sentenced in 2012 and arrived in the UK October 2014, having unsuccessfully challenged the decision to be detained there.

A final peace agreement led to the election of Taylor as President of Liberia in 1997. A second civil war broke out in 1999 and Taylor was forced into exile in 2003.

He was later jailed for committing war crimes in neighbouring Sierra Leone. Police said searches were being carried out at two addresses in east and central London.

Pair in London Have Been on Radar

Two of Mr. Taylor’s relatives, his wife, Dr. Agnes Reeves-Taylor and her sister, Laurice Reeves, currently reside in the United Kingdom, but only one of them, Agnes lives in East London where she reportedly owns one of two homes.

A war crimes police spokesman said Thursday: ‘We continue to liaise with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Crown Prosecution Service regarding this investigation.’

Reeves-Taylor, according to the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the U.S. Department of Treasury was born on September 27, 1965, making her 51, the same age as the woman arrested Thursday.

In February 2011, her brother, Cindor Reeves, credited with helping to build a war crimes case against her former husband, Charles Taylor was denied asylum by the Immigration and Refugee Board in Canada.

Cindor, who was at the centre of Sierra Leone’s blood diamond trade, where gems were exchanged for arms amid the slaughter of innocent people and slave-like conditions in the mines, submitted copies of documents for weapon purchases and diamond smuggling to the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone, helping build much of the case against Taylor.

On the Radar for Some Time

His sister, Agnes, served as Permanent Representative of Liberia to the International Maritime Organization from 1999 to 2005.

Prior to that she was chairman of the board of the Liberian Petroleum Refining Corporation from 1998 – 2003.

She has been on the faculty of the Gabriel International College of Community Developments (GABIC) on whose website she is described as a highly creative and articulate policy and management expert with background in public, private and not for profit sector strategic management and partnership development.

She has a DBA in Business Administration, an MA: International Studies and Diplomacy, an LLM in International Law and an MSc in Economics.

Reeves-Taylor has reportedly been under investigation by British authorities for more than three years following the release of the final TRC report.

FrontPageAfrica has learned from diplomatic sources that the Liberian authorities in the UK have inquired from Scotland Yard but were told no confirmation because it’s an ongoing investigation. Scotland Yard has three days to question a suspect and must charge or release the person.

In July 2012, Taylor-Reeves was removed from both the United Nations Travel and Assets Freeze ban where she was listed as an ex-wife and associate with ongoing ties to Mr. Taylor. She was delisted from the US Treasury Department listing in July 2012.

The UN Committee monitoring sanctions against Liberia in 2001 placed a ban on the former president and more than 130 people from travelling abroad – including his wife, a son and two ex-wives.

The list, approved on Tuesday by the UN committee monitoring sanctions against Liberia, named senior government officials, military commanders and business executives prohibited from travelling.

The resolution at the time ordered nations to “take the necessary measures” to prevent those listed – and their spouses – from travelling through their countries as part of sanctions meant to punish the Liberian government for backing rebels in neighbouring Sierra Leone.

The Security Council also urged countries to crack down on the import of rough diamonds from Liberia. Gems smuggled through the West African nation, dubbed “blood diamonds”, are believed to have funded the brutal, decade-long campaign waged by Sierra Leone’s rebels.