Background

http://www.ijmonitor.org/charles-taylor-background/

Background

Name: Charles Ghankay Taylor
Nationality: Liberian
Arrested: March 29, 2006; Taylor was arrested in Nigeria and transferred into custody of the Special Court for Sierra Leone.
Charges: 11 counts of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other serious violations of international humanitarian law.
Trial start date: January 6, 2008
Trial end date: March 9, 2011
Judgment: April 26, 2012; convicted of all charges.
Sentencing: May 30, 2012; sentenced to 50 years in prison.

Charles Taylor was in Accra, Ghana, attending peace talks, when the news came through that he had been indicted by the Special Court for Sierra Leone on June 4, 2003. He fled back to Liberia, fearing arrest. Two months later, a deal between the United Nations, the United States, the African Union, and ECOWAS (the Economic Community of West African States) was struck to get Taylor out of Liberia. Taylor then went into exile in Nigeria.

Almost three years passed before Taylor was arrested and transferred to the Special Court for Sierra Leone. His time in Nigeria did not go unchallenged, however. Civil society and others were still pushing for him to answer the charges against him in the indictment. In Abuja, Nigeria, two Nigerian businessmen, David Anyaele and Emmanuel Egbuna—whose limbs were allegedly amputated by Taylor’s forces in Liberia—challenged Taylor’s asylum and sought to have him extradited to the Special Court for Sierra Leone to face justice. But the case wound its way through the courts slowly.

Eventually, the new Liberian president, former World Bank official Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, asked for Taylor to be returned to Liberia. Twenty days later, on March 25, 2006, Nigerian president, Olusdegun Obasanjo informed Johnson-Sirleaf that Liberia was “free to take former President Charles Taylor into its custody.” Within 48 hours, Taylor went missing from his seaside villa in Nigeria. Nigerian officials raised the alarm and ordered his arrest. Taylor was caught by Nigerian authorities on March 29, 2006, as he tried to cross the Cameroon border in a Range Rover. Taylor was placed in a Nigerian Government jet with military guard and flown to Monrovia.  Peacekeepers arrested him on the tarmac and put aboard a UN helicopter headed for Freetown, where he was handed over to the Special Court for Sierra Leone.

Citing fears over instability in Liberia if Taylor were tried in neighboring Sierra Leone, Sirleaf-Johnson backed a bid to have Taylor’s trial moved to The Hague. The Dutch Government asked for a Security Council resolution to authorize the transfer, and said it would host Taylor’s trial on the condition that another country agreed in advance to take Taylor after his trial finished (the United Kingdom agreed). Security Council Resolution 1688 was passed unanimously on June 16, 2006, paving the way for Taylor to be tried by the Special Court on the premises of the International Criminal Court in The Hague. Resolution 1688 also requested “all States to cooperate to this end, in particular to ensure the appearance of former President Taylor in the Netherlands for purposes of his trial by the Special Court, and encourages all States as well to ensure that any evidence or witnesses are, upon the request of the Special Court, promptly made available to the Special Court for this purpose.”  After some delays, Taylor’s trial began in earnest on January 7, 2008, in The Hague.

Other trials at the Special Court for Sierra Leone

AFRC trial

Alex Tamba Brima (a.k.a. Tamba Alex Brima, Gullit), senior member of the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), Junta, and AFRC/RUF forces, member of the Junta Governing Body, the Supreme Council. Trial Judgment July 19, 2007: guilty, 50 years single term of imprisonment. Appeal Judgment February 22, 2008: guilty, 50 years single term of imprisonment.

Brima Bazzy Kamara (a.k.a. Ibrahim Bazzy Kamara, Alhaji Ibrahim Kamara), senior member of the AFRC, Junta and AFRC/RUF forces, member of the Junta Governing Body, the Supreme Council. Trial Judgment July 19, 2007: guilty, 45 years single term of imprisonment. Appeal Judgment February 22, 2008: guilty, 45 years single term of imprisonment.

Santigie Borbor Kanu (a.k.a. 55, five-five, Santigie Khanu, Santigie Kanu, S.B. Khanu, S.B. Kanu, Santigie Bobson Kanu, Borbor Santigie Kanu), senior member of the AFRC, Junta and AFRC/RUF forces, member of the Junta Governing Body, the Supreme Council. Trial Judgment July 19, 2007: guilty, 50 years single term of imprisonment. Appeal Judgment February 22, 2008: guilty, 50 years single term of imprisonment.

CDF trial

Samuel Hinga Norman, National Coordinator of the Civil Defense Forces (CDF) and Commander of the Kamajors, first in command. Died February 22, 2007.

Moinina Fofana, National Director of War of the CDF, second in command. Trial Judgment October 9, 2007: guilty on several counts, 6 years total term of imprisonment. Appeal Judgment May 28, 2008, guilty on several counts, 15 years total term of imprisonment.

Allieu Kondewa (a.k.a. Allieu Musa) High Priest of the CDF, directly answerable to Samuel Hinga Norman. Trial Judgment October 9, 2007: guilty on several counts, 8 years total term of imprisonment. Appeal Judgment May 28, 2008, guilty on several counts, 20 years total term of imprisonment.

RUF trial

Issa Hassan Sesay (a.k.a. Issa Sesay), senior officer and commander in the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), Junta, and AFRC/RUF forces. From 1993-1997 RUF Area Commander. From 1997-1999 RUF Battle Group Commander, subordinate only to Sam Bockarie (RUF Battle Field Commander), Foday Sankoh (Leader RUF) and Johnny Paul Koroma (Leader AFRC). During the AFRC regime, member of the Junta Governing Body. In 2000, RUF Battle Field Commander, subordinate only to Foday Sankoh and Johnny Paul Koroma. Trial Judgment February 25, 2009: guilty on 16 counts, sentenced to 52 years of imprisonment. The Appeals Chamber upheld the sentence on October 26, 2009.

Morris Kallon (a.k.a. Bilai Karim), senior officer and commander in the RUF, Junta, and AFRC/RUF forces. From 1996-1998 RUF Deputy Area Commander. From 1998-1999 RUF Battle Field Inspector, subordinate only to Issa Sesay (RUF Battle Group Commander), Sam Bockarie (RUF Battle Field Commander), Foday Sankoh (Leader RUF) and Johnny Paul Koroma (Leader AFRC). During the Junta regime member of the Junta Governing Body. In 2000, RUF Battle Group Commander. From June 2001 Battle Field Commander, subordinate only to Foday Sankoh and Johnny Paul Koroma. Trial judgment February 25, 2009: guilty on 16 counts, sentenced to 40 years imprisonment. The Appeals Chamber upheld the sentence on October 26, 2009.

Augustine Gbao (a.k.a. Augustine Bao), senior officer and commander in the RUF, Junta, and AFRC/RUF forces. From 1996-1998 senior RUF Commander in Kailahun District, subordinate only to the RUF Battle Group Commander, the RUF Battle Field Commander, Foday Sankoh (Leader RUF) and Johnny Paul Koroma (Leader AFRC). From 1998-2002 Overall Security Commander in the AFRC/RUF forces, subordinate only to Foday Sankoh and Johnny Paul Koroma. From 1999-2002 also Joint Commander of AFRC/RUF forces in the Makeni area, Bombali District, subordinate only to the RUF Battlefield Commander, Foday Sankoh (Leader RUF) and Johnny Paul Koroma (Leader AFRC). Trial judgment February 25, 2009: guilty on 14 counts, sentenced to 25 years imprisonment. The Appeals Chamber upheld the sentence on October 26, 2009.

Other indictments by the Special Court for Sierra Leone

The indictments against Foday Saybana Sankoh, Leader and founder of the RUF, and against Samuel Bockarie, Commander in Chief of the RUF, were withdrawn on December 8, 2003, due to the deaths of the two accused.

The whereabouts and fate of Johnny Paul Koroma (a.k.a. JPK), leader of the AFRC, are unknown. The indictment against him remains in force.

More about the Special Court for Sierra Leone

Legitimacy/legal competence of the Special Court for Sierra Leone

• The Special Court has universal jurisdiction to try crimes against humanity and war crimes.
• The Special Court tries only those accused who allegedly bear most responsibility for crimes in Sierra Leone from November 30, 1996. (Article 1(1) of the Statute of the Special Court for Sierra Leone.
• Accused person’s position (Head of State) does not bar jurisdiction for crimes against humanity or war crimes. (Article 6(2) of the Statute of the Special Court for Sierra Leone).

Personal jurisdiction of the Special Court

The personal jurisdiction of the Special Court refers to its power to prosecute only “those who bear the greatest responsibility” for the grave crimes committed in Sierra Leone from November 30, 1996. The prosecutor of the Special Court has defined the phrase “bearing the greatest responsibility” to mean those individuals who served as major commanders in the various fighting factions. While many individuals might have been involved in the conflict in Sierra Leone, it is left with the prosecutor to determine who falls in the category of “those who bear the greatest responsibility.” The statute of the court provides that the official position of an individual, whether as head of state, will not stop the prosecutor from bringing charges against him. While many heads of states have been linked with the conflict in Sierra Leone, such as Presidents Ahmed Tejan Kabbah of Sierra Leone, Blaise Campore of Burkina Faso, Muamarr Ghadafi of Libya, or Lansana Conteh of Guinea, it is the prosecutor’s duty to determine where the evidence leads him. In this case, the prosecutor determined that the evidence led him to Mr. Taylor.

Temporal jurisdiction of the Special Court

The temporal jurisdiction of the Special Court refers to its power to prosecute only those crimes committed from November 30, 1996. While the court can hear evidence of crimes committed prior to November 30, 1996, it cannot find an accused guilty of any such crimes committed prior to that cut-off date. During Mr. Taylor’s trial, many witnesses have testified about events which took place prior to November 30, 1996, in which they alleged that Mr. Taylor was involved. While the prosecution can argue that these issues will build the foundation for the main charges against Mr. Taylor, the judges will not find him guilty based on any activities that occurred prior to November 30, 1996.

Territorial jurisdiction of the Special Court

The territorial jurisdiction of the Special Court refers to its powers to prosecute individuals only for crimes committed in the “territory of Sierra Leone.” While the Special Court can indict and prosecute persons other than Sierra Leoneans, such prosecutions would only be for crimes committed in the territory of Sierra Leone. During the trial of Mr. Taylor, many witnesses have spoken about events which took place in Liberia. The court, however, will only consider those events that took place in Sierra Leone or those events that took place in Liberia but were directly a part of the events taking place in Sierra Leone. For example, if a witness testifies about a meeting in Liberia relating to RUF activities, where Mr. Taylor was present, then such issues will be considered as part of events in Sierra Leone. Or if a witness testifies about arms or diamond trade in Liberia, but which were meant to impact the war in Sierra Leone, those issues will be considered as part of the evidence relating to the war in Sierra Leone. Other than that, if a witness testifies about how the NPFL fought in Liberia or how NPFL commanders were killed in Liberia, they will not form the basis of conviction for the conflict in Sierra Leone

Prosecutors Accuse Charles Taylor Of Using Child Soldiers In Liberia

http://www.ijmonitor.org/2010/01/prosecutors-accuse-charles-taylor-of-using-child-soldiers-in-liberia/

Prosecutors Accuse Charles Taylor Of Using Child Soldiers In Liberia

SUMMARY from CHARLES TAYLOR at the SPECIAL COURT FOR SIERRA LEONE

by Alpha Sesay

January 26, 2010

Charles Taylor recruited and used children for military purposes in Liberia and it was therefore no surprise to him to learn that Sierra Leonean rebel forces were also using child soldiers during the West African country’s 11-year conflict, prosecutors said today during the former Liberian president’s cross-examination.

Lead prosecutor Brenda Hollis who is conducting Mr. Taylor’s cross-examination went through evidence that Mr. Taylor’s National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) rebel group used child soldiers during the Liberian conflict. Mr. Taylor denied Ms. Hollis assertions. Ms. Hollis further suggested that because of Mr. Taylor’s actions in using child soldiers in Liberia, it came as no surprise to him to know that child soldiers were being used by Sierra Leone’s Revolutionary United Front (RUF) and the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), an illegal junta regime that overthrew the elected government of Sierra Leone in 1997. Mr. Taylor said that he had no idea of what the RUF and AFRC did in Sierra Leone. 

“You yourself had armed children, some as young as eight years old,” Ms. Hollis accused Mr. Taylor today.

“That is total nonsense. Every child that I held I put in an orphanage,” Mr. Taylor responded.

Mr. Taylor denied that his forces had child soldiers who patrolled the Liberian border with Ivory Coast in the early 1990s. He also said that it was not to his knowledge that children were acting as bodyguards to his NPFL commanders.

In response to prosecution allegation that he “used children as young as 10 to man check-points,” Mr. Taylor said that “I did not use any children as young as 10 to man check-points. There were soldiers and some of them had their relatives around them but I did not use any children to man check-points.”

As Ms. Hollis asserted that “use of child soldiers by the RUF and AFRC was no surprise to you,” Mr. Taylor responded that “I have no knowledge of what the AFRC and RUF did in Sierra Leone.”

In pointing out the activities of Mr. Taylor’s NPFL in Liberia, Ms. Hollis has been trying to convince the judges that Mr. Taylor knew of similar activities by Sierra Leonean rebel forces but could do nothing to stop them because he was doing the same things in Liberia. Referencing what the RUF rebels did in Sierra Leone, Mr. Taylor responded that “what they did in those areas was not in consistent pattern with me. That is not correct.”

“No surprise to you of what they (RUF) did in Sierra Leone because it is the same that you did in Liberia,” Ms. Hollis persisted. “You were not truthful when you said that crimes committed in Sierra Leone were of surprise to you because they did not happen in Liberia,” she added.

In his response, Mr. Taylor said that “I had no knowledge of the inner workings of the RUF and AFRC.” He added that crimes such as amputations were not committed in Liberia and cases of rape were severely dealt with.

“Your forces committed amputations,” Ms. Hollis said.

“You know that is not true because there are no records of amputations in Liberia,” Ms. Taylor responded.

On the crime of rape, Mr. Taylor said that “I was surprised at rape because people in the NPFL who committed rape in Liberia were executed.”

Ms. Hollis also told Mr. Taylor that “the crimes in Sierra Leone were a reflection of the crimes your troops committed in Liberia. Using children in combat was a reflection of what your forces did in Liberia.”

“That is totally erroneous and incorrect,” Mr. Taylor responded.

Mr. Taylor also today denied prosecution allegations that his forces massacred civilians in Liberia and that he failed to take action against them. Ms. Hollis pointed that NPFL commanders such as Mark Guan, Melvin Sogbandi, Momoh Gibba and Mr. Taylor’s son Chuckie Taylor, all at one point or the other led forces to kill civilians in various towns and villages including Bomi County, Lofa County and Gbatalla. He said that he never received reports that any of these commanders had killed civilians. As Ms. Hollis tried to present documents in support of her assertion, such as the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) report, the judges ruled that such evidence was probative to the guilt of the accused, and since the prosecution had not proved that the use of such new documents will be in the interest of justice or that it will not affect the fair trial rights of the accused, they could not be used in the cross-examination of Mr. Taylor.

Mr. Taylor’s cross-examination continues tomorrow.

Firestone and the Warlord; The untold story of Firestone, Charles Taylor and the tragedy of Liberia.

https://www.propublica.org/article/firestone-and-the-warlord-intro

Firestone and the Warlord; The untold story of Firestone, Charles Taylor and the tragedy of Liberia.

by T. Christian Miller and Jonathan Jones                              November 18, 2014

Key Figures

Bridgestone Americas Inc., often called Firestone, is a subsidiary of Bridgestone Corp., the Japanese tire giant.

Donald Ensminger; A Firestone general manager, Ensminger was opposed to recognizing Charles Taylor as president.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf; Johnson Sirleaf is the current president of Liberia and a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

John “JT” Richardson; Richardson was a top Taylor advisor who lived on the Firestone plantation during Operation Octopus.

Gerald Rose; A top official at the U.S. Embassy, Rose personally disapproved of Firestone’s deal with Taylor.

Charles Taylor; Educated in the U.S., Taylor plunged Liberia into civil war. He was later convicted of war crimes.

Key Events

1926

Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. begins operations at the Firestone plantation in Liberia.

April 12, 1980

Forces led by Master Sargeant Samuel Doe kill Liberian President William Tolbert.

October 26, 1990

Human Rights Watch issues a report criticizing Taylor forces for putting one ethnic group "at risk of genocide."

December 3, 1990

Liberia’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission releases its final report, citing Firestone for aiding Taylor.

1991

Firestone plantation general manager Donald Ensminger says that he is let go from the company after protesting the company’s decision to enter into negotiations with Charles Taylor.

January 12, 1991

The U.S. State Department annual human rights report is released to Congress. The report blamed Charles Taylor’s forces for killing civilians, raping women and forcing hundreds of thousands of people to become refugees during 1990.

July 3, 1991

Firestone corporate executives John Schremp and Richard Stupp meet with warlord Charles Taylor near Gbarnga, Liberia.

January 17, 1992

Firestone and Charles Taylor’s rebel government sign memorandum of understanding.

October 15, 1992

Taylor launches Operation Octopus from Firestone’s Liberian plantation as an all-out attack to capture Monrovia, capital of Liberia.

October 23, 1992

Three American nuns from the Adorers of the Blood of Christ order are killed. Two others had been killed on October 20.

July 8, 1993

John Schremp, the Firestone Akron executive who oversees the plantation, answers Sawyer’s accusations of complicity with Taylor, defending the company.

July 19, 1997

Charles Taylor elected president of Liberia with 75 percent of the vote.

March 7, 2003

Charles Taylor is indicted by the Special Court for Sierra Leone for crimes against humanity.

November 23, 2005

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is declared the winner of Liberia’s presidential elections. She becomes the first elected female head of state in Africa.

April 28, 2012

Charles Taylor is found guilty on 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity by the Special Court for Sierra Leone. He becomes the first head of state since Nazi Germany to be found guilty. of such crimes. He is sentenced to 50 years in prison

A joint reporting project by ProPublica and PBS Frontline, “Firestone and the Warlord” reached hundreds of thousands of viewers when it first aired Nov. 18. “Chilling,” Salon wrote. “Gripping,” said Fortune. “An example of the reason we bother to scrutinize history,” said the New York Times. The project provoked conversation and upset among American and Liberian officials, as well as everyday citizens in the African nation whose trail of tears has most recently included the deadly Ebola outbreak. Accompanying its Feb. 3 rebroadcast, we are offering another chance to read the story here.

HARBEL, Liberia — THE KILLERS LAUNCHED from the plantation under a waning moon one night in October 1992. They surged past tin-roofed villages and jungle hideouts, down macadam roads and red-clay bush trails. More and more joined their ranks until thousands of men in long, ragged columns moved toward the distant capital.

Men in camouflage mounted rusted artillery cannon in battered pickup trucks. Thin teenagers lugged rocket-propelled grenade launchers. Children carried AK-47s. Some held long machetes.

The killers wore ripped jeans and T-shirts, women’s wigs and cheap rubber sandals. Grotesque masks made them look like demons. They were electric with drugs. They clutched talismans of feather and bone to protect them from bullets. In the pre-dawn darkness, they surrounded Monrovia, the capital of Liberia.

They loosed their attack on the sleeping city. Artillery slammed into stores and homes. Mortars arced through thick, humid air that smelled of rot. Boy soldiers canoed across mangrove swamps. As they pressed in, the killers forced men, women and children from their homes. They murdered civilians and soldiers. Falling shells just missed the U.S. Embassy, hunkered on a high spot overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.

A new phase of Liberia’s civil war had begun. It would whip savagely out of control over the next decade. More than 200,000 people would die or suffer terrible injuries, most of them civilians — limbs hacked off, eyes gouged out. Half the country’s population would become refugees. Five American nuns would be slaughtered, becoming international symbols of the conflict’s depravity.

Orchestrating the anarchy was Charles Taylor, a suave egomaniac obsessed with taking over Liberia, America’s most faithful ally in Africa. For the attack that October morning, he had built his army of butchers and believers in part with the resources of one of America’s most iconic businesses: Firestone.

Firestone has operated a rubber plantation in Liberia since 1926.

Firestone ran the plantation that Taylor used to direct the October 1992 assault on Monrovia. In operation since 1926, the rubber plantation was considered to be the largest of its kind in the world, a contiguous swath of trees, mud-brown rivers, low hills and verdant bush that at the time splayed across 220 square miles – roughly the size of Chicago.

Firestone wanted Liberia for its rubber. Taylor wanted Firestone to help his rise to power. At a pivotal meeting in Liberia’s jungles in July 1991, the company agreed to do business with the warlord.

In the first detailed examination of the relationship between Firestone and Taylor, an investigation by ProPublica and Frontline lays bare the role of a global corporation in a brutal African conflict.

Firestone served as a source of food, fuel, trucks and cash used by Taylor’s ragtag rebel army, according to interviews, internal corporate documents and declassified diplomatic cables.

The company signed a deal in 1992 to pay taxes to Taylor’s rebel government. Over the next year, the company doled out more than $2.3 million in cash, checks and food to Taylor, according to an accounting in court files. Between 1990 and 1993, the company invested $35.3 million in the plantation.

In return, Taylor’s forces provided security to the plantation that allowed Firestone to produce rubber and safeguard its assets. Taylor’s rebel government offered lower export taxes that gave the company a financial break on rubber shipments.

We needed Firestone to give us international legitimacy. We needed them for credibility.

John Toussaint Richardson, one of Taylor’s top advisers

For Taylor, the relationship with Firestone was about more than money. It helped provide him with the political capital and recognition he needed as he sought to establish his credentials as Liberia’s future leader.

“We needed Firestone to give us international legitimacy,” said John Toussaint “J.T.” Richardson, a U.S.-trained architect who became one of Taylor’s top advisers. “We needed them for credibility.”

While Firestone used the plantation for the business of rubber, Taylor used it for the business of war. Taylor turned storage centers and factories on Firestone’s sprawling rubber farm into depots for weapons and ammunition. He housed himself and his top ministers in Firestone homes. He also used communications equipment on the plantation to broadcast messages to his supporters, propaganda to the masses and instructions to his troops.

Secret U.S. diplomatic cables from the time captured Taylor’s gratitude to Firestone. Firestone’s plantation “had been the lifeblood” of the territory in Liberia that he controlled, Taylor told one Firestone executive, according to a State Department cable. Taylor later said in sworn testimony that Firestone’s resources had been the “most significant” source of foreign exchange in the early years of his revolt.

In written responses to questions, Firestone acknowledged the agreement with Taylor, but said it had never willingly assisted Taylor’s insurrection.

Charles Taylor's rebels cobbled together weapons for indiscriminate assaults on Monrovia. (Patrick Robert/Sygma/Corbis)

The company said Taylor rebels had used Firestone’s trucks, food, medical supplies, fuel and tools under the “obvious threat of violence to anyone who considered stopping them.”

“Firestone had no role in the rise of Charles Taylor. It had no role in his ability to hold power in Liberia,” the company said.

“At no time did Firestone have a collaborative relationship with Charles Taylor,” the statement said. “The company’s activities were focused on protecting its employees and property. The company had no ability to stop Taylor’s forces from using the plantation for any purposes.”

At the moment of the October 1992 attack that came to be known as Operation Octopus, Taylor controlled the vast majority of Liberia. He faced a weak interim government in Monrovia, backed by 7,000 largely untested soldiers from allied West African nations.

Operation Octopus effectively plunged the country into five more turbulent, terrible years of intermittent warfare. Taylor turned a civil war between his forces and the Liberian government into a bloodbath as more rebel factions joined in the fight for spoils: diamonds, timber, power. It spilled into neighboring Guinea and Sierra Leone, where rebel forces allied with Taylor hacked the limbs off civilians in a terror campaign of unchecked brutality.

In July 1997, Taylor won his war, and not on the battlefield. He was elected president, dominating with 75 percent of the vote. For many Liberians, a vote for Taylor was a vote of resignation. Many believed it was the only way to stop the killing. After Taylor became president, more factions arose, more bloodletting, more revenge. Liberia and its people suffered yet again.

In 2003, Taylor was indicted by an international tribunal for war crimes committed in Sierra Leone. He resigned the presidency. He was eventually sentenced to 50 years in prison — the first head of state to be convicted of crimes against humanity since the Nazi era.

The path to cooperation was neither direct nor easy for Firestone and its executives, according to interviews and documents. Some company officials actively resisted working with Taylor and his fighters, even in the face of real and implied threats of physical violence.

Do I think they have blood on their hands? Yes. I believe they facilitated a warlord in his insurrection and in the atrocities that he created.

Gerald Rose, former deputy chief of mission for the U.S. Embassy in Monrovia

Other senior officers felt the company had no choice but to give in to Taylor’s demands. They believed that working with Taylor was the only way to protect the thousands of impoverished Liberians who lived and labored on the plantation.

Firestone also received conflicting direction from the United States government. One ambassador urged the company to work with Taylor. In Washington, diplomats warned Firestone executives about the dangers of doing business with him.

But in the end, Firestone as a corporation, and as a collection of men, made a deliberate decision to cooperate with a man whose forces were publicly denounced as violent, vicious and rapacious by the U.S. government and human rights groups.

The U.S. State Department had issued a report blaming Taylor’s forces for killing civilians, raping women and forcing hundreds of thousands of people to become refugees. Human Rights Watch said that Taylor’s forces had engaged in a killing campaign that put a targeted ethnic group at “risk of genocide.”

Today, Firestone maintains that at the time it struck its deal with Taylor, the guerrilla leader had “no well-established record” of human right violations. It said that many other companies and world leaders had treated Taylor as a legitimate political figure. Other companies operating in Liberia at the time chose to leave. But some stayed on through the violence.

“Does Firestone believe it did the right thing? Yes,” Firestone said of its decisions in Liberia. “Do we, along with former U.S. presidents, the U.S. State Department, the United Nations and many leaders around the world who worked with Charles Taylor regret the war criminal he became? Yes.”

The decision that Firestone faced confronts American companies operating to this day in war-torn, volatile regions in an increasingly globalized economy. All aim to make money. All must weigh, to one degree or another, their hierarchy of obligations – to their shareholders, to their foreign workers, to their host countries, and to their own sense of right and wrong.

Charles Taylor was sentenced to 50 years in prison for "aiding and abetting ... some of the most heinous and brutal crimes recorded in human history." (Jerry Lampen/AFP/Getty Images)

Donald Ensminger served as the managing director of the Firestone plantation when Taylor invaded Liberia. He witnessed the violence first hand. Taylor rebels killed and imprisoned his workers. They threatened Ensminger with death at the point of a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.

Ensminger was let go from the company in October 1991. For the next 23 years, he kept silent about Firestone’s choice to do a deal with a warlord. Now, he told Frontline and ProPublica, he wanted to explain.

He said that he warned Firestone that Taylor was a killer. He told the company that working with him might be a crime. He urged them to avoid deals that might legitimize the guerilla leader as the ruler of Liberia.

For him, the decision was clear. And Firestone got it wrong.

“Certainly on behalf of our employees, the ones that were killed and suffered, it was immoral that we should now recognize the guy that caused all this,” he said in an interview.

Gerald Rose, who served as the deputy chief of mission in Liberia at the time, holds an equally unsparing view of Firestone’s choice.

“Do I think they have blood on their hands? Yes,” Rose said. “I would not have made the decisions they made. I believe they facilitated a warlord in his insurrection and in the atrocities that he created.”

Through the years, Liberia has been hesitant to examine its past. Taylor, for instance, was tried only for harm he caused in Sierra Leone, not Liberia. In 2009, the country’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission recommended sanctions for scores of perpetrators. It cited Firestone for having aided Taylor in carrying out his rebellion and called for more investigation. The Liberian government never acted on those recommendations.

The stunning truth is that nobody has ever been punished in Liberia for the civil war that destroyed the nation. In fact, some of the people who helped to wreck the country are now the same people responsible for rebuilding it.

Charles Taylor's civil war included the use of child soldiers and scenes of gruesome violence. (Patrick Robert/Sygma/Corbis)

Top officials of formerly warring factions are now politicians passing laws in the legislature. They are pastors preaching from the country’s pulpits. They are executives running some of the country’s largest businesses.

The damage they inflicted on Liberia haunts the country even today. Liberia’s shattered infrastructure and weakened health system have struggled to cope with the spread of the Ebola virus, which has killed thousands of Liberians.

In an interview with Frontline and ProPublica, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf acknowledged that Liberia had not yet succeeded in shaking the Taylor regime or the devils of its history.

“The effect of that regime and regimes of the past are still with us today,” she said. “Today we have a traumatized nation.”

Efforts over many months to reach Taylor through his lawyers and family were not successful.

Johnson Sirleaf looked thoughtful when asked to describe Liberia’s relationship with Firestone. A Nobel Peace Prize winner, Johnson Sirleaf said the company had benefitted Liberia with jobs and revenue.

In fact, during its decades of operation, Firestone had built a nation within a nation. The company provided housing, schools, food and health care to workers and their families. Some 80,000 Liberians lived within its borders. Firestone introduced currency, built roads and opened up the rural interior.

At the same time, Johnson Sirleaf said, Firestone has sometimes failed to live up to its obligations to the country whose people have provided it with so much over so many years. Over the decades, the company has faced accusations that it exploited its laborers, received unfair concession deals, despoiled the environment and exacerbated corruption.

Said Johnson Sirleaf: “It is a mixed story.”

Charles Taylor and the rubber company- Feel free to copy! :)

http://newafricanmagazine.com/charles-taylor-rubber-company/ 

Charles Taylor and the rubber company

A new investigative documentary aims to expose the history of US rubber company Firestone’s engagement in Liberia. But in failing to follow the money, talk to key Liberians and explore the company’s labour and environmental practices, the film falls a long way short, as Robtel Neajai Pailey explains.

Despite being released to great fanfare in the US on 18 November, the investigative documentary Firestone and the Warlord is disappointing. As someone who has extensively studied and written about Firestone, a tyre and rubber company founded in Ohio in the US, which has operated in Liberia since 1926, I believe the film’s producers simply did not dig deep enough.

There are some merits to the ProPublica/Frontline documentary such as the revelations from court documents, US State Department cables, Firestone corporate records, correspondences, and video footage – but they ultimately conceal more than  they reveal of Firestone’s asymmetrical relationship with Liberia.

The film’s narration begins: “This is a story about business and war. It’s a story about a small group of Americans and the choices they made many years ago. A story about the cost of operating in a volatile and remote country. Its setting is a rubber plantation in Africa, owned and operated by Firestone.”

From the outset, the narration harks back to Joseph Conrad’s description of the Belgian Congo in Heart of Darkness. Liberia is an unnamed African backdrop of savagery, calamity and doom, while Firestone and its US workers, like Kurtz in Conrad’s novel, are presumed innocent until they encounter “the horror”. For the first eight minutes of the film, we are bombarded with an often distorted and caricatured interpretation of Liberia’s history by white male diplomats, journalists, and former Firestone managers. We do not hear from two of Liberia’s pre-eminent statesmen and scholars, Dr D. Elwood Dunn and Dr Amos Sawyer, until much later. It sets the tone of the film as primarily concerned with the perspectives of non-Liberians.

In an attempt to make the narrative palatable to a US audience, the film vilifies Charles Taylor, Liberia’s militant-turned-president, while portraying Firestone as morally superior. It remains surprising that the film’s title was not “Charles Taylor and the Rubber Company” since the gratuitous war imagery employed to demonise the former Liberian president makes him the central feature of the documentary. Taylor is referenced with accompanying video footage, from his years in combat to his trial in The Hague for war crimes committed during neighbouring Sierra Leone’s 11-year armed conflict. It primarily paints the rubber company as a coerced, innocent victim of Taylor’s brutality.

“When evil is given an opportunity to reign freely, these things occur,” says former Firestone accountant Steve Raimo, who reduces Liberia’s conflict to “tribal warfare”. His former colleague Ken Gerhart continues with a mocking smile on his face: “Well, if they were the right tribe, they survived. If they weren’t, they didn’t.” Missing from their skewed analysis of Liberia’s armed insurgency are the shifting geopolitics of the Cold War, the country’s rising inequality and politicisation of identity and the alleged US complicity in Taylor’s mysterious US jailbreak.

In diminishing Liberia’s conflict to the irrational machinations of African “tribes”, the film appears less concerned with Firestone’s business practices and more obsessed with Taylor’s warmongering. Firestone is largely portrayed as a law-abiding, tax-paying, responsible contributor to formal employment in Liberia.

The film’s narrator argues that when Liberia offered Firestone a chance to develop a million acres of rubber at six cents per acre in 1926 that it was a “mutually beneficial arrangement”. But for whom? Throughout the film, the Firestone plantation pre-1989 is painted as a tranquil place for the mostly Liberian labour force. Yet while the film exposes the “good life” of the company’s expatriate managers, the living conditions and the low wages of Firestone’s Liberian employees is generally glossed over.

During the early part of Liberia’s armed conflict the company shut down and its foreign staff left the country in 1992. Shortly thereafter, they return to do business, but must first contend with Taylor.

In a twist of irony, the film shows footage of Taylor scolding Firestone’s foreign senior staff for their negligence: “There’s a little war, and you leave…there’s no water, no food…it’s inexcusable.” Accusing management of abandoning plantation workers, Taylor demands to know how Firestone will make amends.

In 1992, the company signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Taylor to resume operations, which was crucial for Taylor. At the Hague, he said that Firestone provided economic and political capital during the conflict.

Edwin Cisco, president of the Firestone Workers’ Union, argues that the company’s motivations boiled down to “profit, profit, and profit”. Yet, while the film harps on about the fact that Firestone paid Taylor US$2.3m in “taxes” and spent $35.3m on the plantation and its workers between June 1990 and February 1993, the unaddressed elephant in the room is how much profit Firestone made. The company has never revealed its earnings.

But the film reminds us that Taylor siphoned off huge sums from the spoils of war, while the same level of scrutiny is not paid to Firestone’s revenue stream.

One former Firestone manager says unabashedly, “Firestone’s intent has always been to make money. It always has and it always will be. We’re in the business to make money.” Although the film is meant to be an exposé, it neither pursues the money trail nor questions why such financial information is concealed.

One US diplomat argues in the film that “Firestone has blood on its hands” because of resumption of operations in the midst of armed conflict. This may be true but Firestone’s labour relations could also be violent. When workers demonstrated against the company’s arbitrary decision in 1997 to deduct 38% of their monthly salaries to replace money that had allegedly been stolen during the first Liberian armed conflict, then president Taylor unleashed his security personnel to attack 7,000 unarmed demonstrators.

In the film, Herman Cohen, former US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, and other diplomats condemn Taylor for being “venal” and “unsavoury”, yet do not once interrogate Firestone’s practices. The film ignores the backlash against Firestone crystallised in a transnational campaign, Stop Firestone, spearheaded in 2005 by Liberians and an international coalition. The campaign was largely based on a groundbreaking report “Firestone: The Mark of Modern Slavery” by the Liberian NGO Save My Future Foundation (SAMFU). SAMFU representatives were not interviewed for the film.

Also glaringly missing is that in November 2005, 35 Liberian plaintiffs filed a class action suit in a US court alleging that Bridgestone Corporation and Bridgestone North American Tire, the parent company of Firestone Liberia, had violated labour laws by using child labour and cruel labour practices by instituting unrealistic daily quotas, dumping toxic substances in the plantation’s only water source, the Farmington River. The film does not interview Alfred Brownell, the Liberian lead attorney on the case. It should be noted that the plaintiffs did lose the case.

On the other hand, we do hear Gerald Padmore, a Liberian attorney and Firestone legal representative arguing Firestone’s case: “They [Firestone] did the right thing, they did not try to exploit the country…They did not pay off warlords or give money under the table. They didn’t do any of those things. They did the right thing.” It almost feels like ProPublica and Frontline went out of their way to find a Liberian who would support Firestone’s innocence.

Rather than climaxing with a critique of Firestone, the closing narration of the film reframes the company as largely exempt from culpability because it has “invested more than $146m to improve conditions on the plantation in Liberia and remains the country’s largest private employer.”

The irony is that Firestone has not built a single processing plant in its almost 100 years of operation. On the world’s largest industrial rubber plantation, the company could not produce one latex glove in Liberia to shield healthcare workers from the Ebola outbreak.

As Dunn asserts: “Firestone has been able to get away with what it has because of a combination of factors – Liberian regimes’ permissiveness, US government support for its business interest and the media (local and international) failing to beam the spotlight on the company’s transgressions.”

Unfortunately for Liberians Firestone and the Warlord has done little to help correct that injustice

Charles Taylor analysis front *Do not copy*

Was Charles Taylor Flamboyant? Or was that just a front?

Charles Taylor, although flamboyant in public, was not truly such a showman at heart. His actions during his regime were a front to control his people, and when faced with legal adversity it fell quickly. He acted flamboyantly to his people and the outside world to make himself seem strange, foreign and unapproachable. He did a few things to make him seem more African, like adding Ghankay to his name, but other than that, his policies were meant to separate and isolate. Taylor made friends with politicians and business people during his time outside Liberia, and this supports the idea that he was not truly flamboyant. Flamboyancy would not have helped him gain the trust of Gaddafi or other conservative leaders. Showmanship only impresses those who are already entranced, not the skeptics.

The article cites his capture as evidence of his showmanship, but if he had gone down without a fight, we would not be covering him. If he did not take potentially life-threating risks, he would never have risen to power. His suit with a red tie is also called showmanship, but that is the norm in western courts, so it can be seen as an attempt to blend in, not stand out, as well as an attempt to hide a bulletproof vest like the one he arrived in. When he initially took power, he had to act energetic and showy to gain the west’s attention and gain any notoriety, good or bad. He wanted to stand out, and shows up in full military combat gear or a white robe is an excellent way to do just that. After he gained the attention, he began to scale back, while still making a point and instilling some hint of fear into the other leaders. 

Charles Taylor Analysis *Do not copy*

Charles Taylor 

Why Taylor spurred on he Civil War and why he believed he was unfairly sentenced

            Taylor spurred on the Sierra Leonean Civil War by funding the rebel groups. In exchange for diamonds from the combat zones, Taylor gave the Revolutionary United Front arms and other support, and those soldiers hacked off the limbs of civilians. The RUF was reportedly making over $100 million annually from the blood diamond trade during the war, courtesy of Charles Taylor’s help. Liberia also supported the RUF with money from the lumber industry, were tens of millions in profit were missing from state coffers. Taylor believed with a sympathetic ruler in Sierra Leone, he could monopolize the diamond trade further, and make a larger profit.

            Taylor believes that is sentencing is unfair because it is “impossible” for him to have ordered the killings, rapes, and amputations. He claims full innocence on all accounts, and admitted nothing. He says he is “no threat to society,” and that “Money played a corrupting role in this trial.” Taylor goes on to declare George W. Bush a war criminal, citing his admittance of torture.

           

Reconstruction and the New South links

http://quizlet.com/5340807/chapter-15-reconstruction-and-the-new-south-flash-cards/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconstruction_Era

www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCgDmLpqQbM

http://www.histnotes.com/US_Ch._15.html

you're welcome

ASL examples of storytelling

Compiled by Gabriela Monasterio and Stephanie Jones

Deaf Hulk!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZjAVRjxMHU

Reiteration: 0:24 - 0:29

He says he punched all the guys out and then signed each punch.

Scaffolding: 1:14 - 1:22

He has “tunnel vision” and signs it as things passing by him and suddenly snapping out of it when someone taps his shoulder.

ASL Frog Story

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYXOpci7wCc

Scaffolding:0:10 - 3:32

The frog is in an area, with lots of trees and plants. The trees have mushrooms growing all over them.

Reiteration: 1:14 - 1:35

The frog looks around (“F” eyes) at its surroundings, and looks for flies. It sees and tracks a fly, then eats it. the reiteration is in both the looking and the fly.

ASL Story: The Tree

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUhFPrU3uHw

Scaffolding: 0:18 - 1:11

The tree grows from a seed to maturity, showing each stage. The seedling pokes up through the dirt, grows taller, and develops into a fully grown tree.

Reiteration: 1:56 - 2:02

The person is hot, goes under the tree, is cool, walks back, and is hot again. The fanning is repeated multiple times.

Timber (ASL story)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bMuWpcOvNY

Scaffolding: 0:23 - 0:28

She describes the axe and shows it thrown over her shoulder to show she has an axe, without actually signing it.

Scaffolding: 0:30 - 0:32

Instead of signing lunch box, she describes the box shape and shows food goes inside of it. Thus letting the audience know it is a lunch bag of some sort.

ABC Gum

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdR7iyXJEsk

Scaffolding: 0:00 - 0:08

In the first few seconds of the video, she describes the boy enjoying the gum and chewing it over and over, his teeth grinding the gum and more chewing.

Reiteration: 0:44 - 0:48

She describes the man being unable to get up and trying over and over again.

Rolling in the Deep Adele (ASL)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjNHUhA8Wbg

Faceting: 0:10 - 0:13

She repeats how the thoughts of him are building up and are stuck in her mind