Mistænkes for for at deltage i gruopvækkende forbrydelser
Former Liberian rebel leader George Boley is to be deported from the US over his role in the West African country’s civil war in the 1990s.
A US judge said evidence that the ex-Liberian Peace Council (LPC) leader had been involved in killings and recruited children was grounds for his removal, BBC online reports Tuesday.
Mr Boley, who has been in custody for two years, denies the accusations. Around a quarter of a million people died during Liberia’s 1989-2003 conflict.
At the height of the civil war there were seven armed groups fighting – and the LPC was one of the largest. In 1995, Mr Boley joined other warlords, including Charles Taylor, to lead an interim council for about a year. After presidential elections in 1997, the conflict resumed.
US immigration officials said it was the first time the use of child soldiers had been used as a grounds for removal from the US.
The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) said there was evidence from Liberia’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) that Mr Boley’s rebel group had burned dozens of captives accused of witchcraft in 1994.
Witnesses told the TRC that in 1995 Liberian Peace Council fighters massacred 27 villagers “ordering them to lie down before they slit their throats with cutlasses (store knive) and raping the women before they killed them”, Ice said in a statement.
Mr Taylor, who won presidential elections in 1997, is on trial for war crimes at at UN-backed court sitting at The Hague for his part in neighbouring Sierra Leone’s civil war. He had gone into exile in 2003 to Nigeria, where he was arrested.
Mr Boley has 30 days to appeal against the deportation ruling, BBC notes.
