Fighting in Liberia Spreads to Northwestern Town, Civilians Flee Toward Capital

AP ^ | Published: May 24, 2002 | By Jonathan Paye-Layleh Associated Press Writer

[Bad~Rodeo]

MONROVIA, Liberia (AP) - Rebel forces attacked a northwestern Liberian town Friday, sending frightened civilians fleeing toward the capital, government officials said.

Intermittent explosions from the fighting in Gbah could be heard from the outskirts of Monrovia, just 25 miles away.

The rebel fighters emerged from the nearby Guthrie rubber plantation, which had come under attack the previous day, defense officials said on condition of anonymity.

Fighting between government and rebel forces along the road linking Monrovia to Sierra Leone has blocked access from the capital to the border.

Scores of civilians hoped to find safety in Monrovia, according to families who were waiting Friday in packed taxis at a checkpoint outside the coastal city.

Meanwhile, sporadic gunfire continued around the northwestern towns of Sweh, Mecca, Tubmanburg and diamond-rich Lofa Bridge, defense officials said.

Warlord-turned-President Charles Taylor has faced some of the toughest fighting in a 3-year-old insurrection in recent weeks.

He says he is being targeted by losing factions from the West African country's bloody 1989-96 civil war, backed by Guinea.

Guinea denies the charge and accuses Liberia of supporting its own dissidents, as well as rebels from Sierra Leone who have attacked Guinean villages in the past.

Sierra Leone President Ahmed Tejan Kabbah flew Thursday to Guinea to discuss the surge in fighting with his counterpart, Lansana Conte.

The two leaders expressed a commitment to help restore peace in the troubled region in a joint statement issued late Thursday.

They also agreed to reopen a key border crossing between their respective countries following Sierra Leone's first post-war elections. A bloody 10-year civil war was officially declared over in Sierra Leone in January.

[Steve Eisenberg]

Now here is a rebellion we should pray succeeds. It is hard to imagine worse than the existing Taylor regime.

[PatrickHenry]

Charles Taylor of Liberia

[LarryLied]

Taylor has been propped up by Leonid Minin and former IDF officer Col. Yair Klein. In the 1980's, Klein organized hit squards for cocaine cartels in Colombia. Arms for diamonds and tropic woods has been the lure of Liberia and Sierra Leone. The Ukraine, the Russian mob and Israel are all involved. Maybe even Jesse Jackson who Clinton sent over as an envoy. A difficult web to untangle. PBS ran a story on it last night.

[backhoe]

AfricaWatch:

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[FourPeas]

It is hard to imagine worse than the existing Taylor regime.

Sadly true. A friend brought over her daughter and 2yo granddaughter from Liberia several years ago. The first time my friend used her vacuum cleaner, her granddaughter ran and crouched under the end table. Because motar fire was common, her mother had wisely trained her that whenever she heard a loud noise to hide under something.

[LarryLied]

Dirty diamonds
By Michael Barone
What do Jesse Jackson, Pat Robertson, and al Qaeda have in common?
The answer is: They all have been associated with the bloody Liberian dictator Charles Taylor.
USNEWS.COM 11/12/01

[Bogey78O]

Wasn't Liberia a place created for freed blacks to get away from white oppression?

[LarryLied]

They've reverted back 200 years. Taylor is selling his fellow Africans into slavery on logging plantations run by Europeans.

[B Knotts]

Given the accusation of Guinea involvement, is it safe to assume this is, at least in part, yet another Muslim insurgency?

I notice that Liberia has a 20% Muslim population, and Guinea has 80%+.

[Arleigh]

Ayup, started by the American Colonization Society in 1822. They even modeled their government on the US Constitution.

Well, then I can't understand why Liberia isn't a great place to live. After all, it's our Constitution and Bill of Rights that make America such a great country, right? The culture and heritage of the people that founded her had nothing to do with it, right? As the ethnic composition of America's population changes, it won't matter at all as long as we have the Constitution, right?

[Gal.5:1]

1847 Liberia became Black Africa's first independent state. The dominance of the Liberians of American origin (who founded the state officially) ended in the bloody coup of 1980 and the military gov't. became increasingly unstable. Massive corruption and repression of the Mano and Gio proples provoked the 1980 bloody coup revolution led by Charles Taylor. (The last 2 "presidents" have come in by murdering thier predecessor horribly). An orgy of inter- tribal killings ensued as the war engulfed the country in the 90's. Things have settled down a bit since '97 and Taylor is still in power. 250,000 Liberians were killed and 1 million became refugees abroad and 500,000 still remain in surrounding areas. The nation is devastated infrastructurally, emotionally, economically & every other way.

Liberia was founded as a Christian state. There is freedom of religion in theory but there is lots of cultural pressure to conform to occult secret societies. Religion breakdown, rounded off is, traditional/tribal (animism/voodoo/witchcraft) 48%, Christian 38%, Muslim 13%

A major tragedy. I lived there myself in 1988 just before the war began, and I saw it beginning. Recovery from this civil war will take decades, even with an upright government, which this is not.