Given an ultimatum by rebels to voluntarily step down from office or be ousted by force, Liberian President Charles Taylor is believed to have abandoned the presidential palace on Monday for a compound in the Monrovia suburb of Congotown near Liberia's international airport. Taylor has made no public statement since last Friday when he gathered reporters in the capital Monrovia to talk about what he called a "failed" coup backed by foreign powers. "The attempt was foiled because the generals of the army refused," he said.
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Taylor made the statement just 24 hours after the United Nations-backed Sierra Leone Special Court announced his indictment for war crimes and issued an international warrant for his arrest.
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When the indictment was announced, Taylor was in Ghana participating in peace talks with Liberian rebels that had been arranged by the 15-nation Economic Community for West Africa (Ecowas). Almost immediately after news of the indictment was release, the rebel drive into Monrovia intensified, with shells dropping in suburban Monrovian neighborhoods by Sunday night. That same night, the country's largest rebel organization, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (Lurd) gave Taylor until Wednesday to resign or face a offensive aimed at capturing the capital and removing him militarily.
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"We want the international community to ask him to step down so as to avoid bloodshed," LURD chairman Sehon Damate Conneh Jr. told the Associated Press Sunday in Rome. Conneh said the Lurd thrust was pausing on the edge of Monrovia to give the Liberian leader the opportunity to get out of the way. "If Taylor doesn't step down [in three days], we would go in," Conneh said.
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Taylor's family was reportedly evacuated by air from Monrovia to Ghana Saturday night. But Taylor plans to stay in Monrovia, according to the charge d'affaires in Liberia's Washington, D.C. embassy, Aaron B. Kollie. "He will resist any attempt by these armed guerillas and terrorists to overrun the city," Kollie told AllAfrica. |