Taylor may die in jail

The appeals chamber at the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone has rejected an appeal by the defence in the trial of the former Liberian president Charles Taylor. The court upheld the 50-year sentence handed down by the trial chamber in May 2012 in The Hague. In his 60s, this effectively means Taylor will die in prison. Some Sierra Leone government officials and Western diplomats had told Politico before the verdict that it would “unthinkable” for a lenient sentence for the man convicted by the court in The Hague on all 11 counts of aiding and abetting war crimes in Sierra Leone during a war that cost the lives of tens of thousands of people and the maiming of several other thousands. Both the prosecution and the defence had launched an appeal on varied grounds following his conviction on 11 counts and sentencing to 50 years in prison in April and May 2012 respectively. The prosecution had asked for an 80-year jail term and had argued that Mr Taylor had command responsibility in a joint criminal enterprise in Sierra Leone while he was president of Liberia. The trial chamber convicted him on all 11 counts but on lower level grounds of aiding and abetting the commission of some of the most heinous crimes in war.  According to Special Court watcher, Alpha Sesay, the prosecutors were "hoping for Appeals Chamber judges to agree with them that the Trial Chamber was wrong to have acquitted Taylor on charges of ordering and instigating the commission of crimes, or that Taylor ought to have been sentenced to a jail term exceeding 50 years”. The defence team on the other hand appealed both against the grounds of conviction and the length of the jail term. While they have not stated the number of years they think the former Liberian president should be given, they say 50 years is too much. On grounds of the conviction, the Defense lawyers wanted the appeals court to rule that the “Trial Chamber erred in finding that Taylor provided military and operational advice to RUF and AFRC, which constituted assistance to crimes, and that they erred in finding that Taylor was aware of shipment of arms from/via Liberia to Sierra Leone” according to Sesay. He says the defence would have liked the April 2012 judgement overturned because, they argue, Taylor did not help “in planning the rebel attacks in specific parts of the country, including Freetown. The appeals chamber would have none of that. It is not immediately clear where Taylor will serve his jail term. Britain, Sweden and Rwanda have all offered to put him up. All convicts at teh Special Court are serving their jail terms in Rwanda. © Politico 26/09/13