The first witness in former Liberian president Charles Taylor's war crimes trial testified that Sierra Leone rebels backed by Taylor mutilated and terrorized civilians to seize diamond fields and that Taylor used the profits to buy weapons.
But Taylor's lawyers on Monday challenged prosecutors to present evidence that linked him to widespread murder, rape and amputations during Sierra Leone's bloody civil war.
Miners -- often slave laborers kidnapped by Sierra Leone's Revolutionary United Front (RUF) -- dug up diamonds worth between US$60 million and US$125 million each year, said Ian Smillie, a Canadian expert on conflict diamonds.
Prosecutors allege the diamonds were smuggled through Liberia and Taylor used the proceeds to buy arms and ammunition for the rebels -- earning them the name "blood diamonds."
Taylor's trial resumed after a six month recess. It was adjourned last June after a chaotic opening day during which he boycotted proceedings and fired his lawyer.
Taylor, 59, has pleaded innocent to all 11 charges of orchestrating rape, murder and mutilation in Sierra Leone from his presidential palace in Monrovia.
Taylor is the first former African head of state to appear before an international tribunal.
Asian perspectives of the US have shifted from a country once perceived as a force of “moral legitimacy” to something akin to “a landlord seeking rent,” Singaporean Minister for Defence Ng Eng Hen (黃永宏) said on the sidelines of an international security meeting. Ng said in a round-table discussion at the Munich Security Conference in Germany that assumptions undertaken in the years after the end of World War II have fundamentally changed. One example is that from the time of former US president John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address more than 60 years ago, the image of the US was of a country
Cook Islands officials yesterday said they had discussed seabed minerals research with China as the small Pacific island mulls deep-sea mining of its waters. The self-governing country of 17,000 people — a former colony of close partner New Zealand — has licensed three companies to explore the seabed for nodules rich in metals such as nickel and cobalt, which are used in electric vehicle (EV) batteries. Despite issuing the five-year exploration licenses in 2022, the Cook Islands government said it would not decide whether to harvest the potato-sized nodules until it has assessed environmental and other impacts. Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown
BLIND COST CUTTING: A DOGE push to lay off 2,000 energy department workers resulted in hundreds of staff at a nuclear security agency being fired — then ‘unfired’ US President Donald Trump’s administration has halted the firings of hundreds of federal employees who were tasked with working on the nation’s nuclear weapons programs, in an about-face that has left workers confused and experts cautioning that the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE’s) blind cost cutting would put communities at risk. Three US officials who spoke to The Associated Press said up to 350 employees at the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) were abruptly laid off late on Thursday, with some losing access to e-mail before they’d learned they were fired, only to try to enter their offices on Friday morning
STEADFAST DART: The six-week exercise, which involves about 10,000 troops from nine nations, focuses on rapid deployment scenarios and multidomain operations NATO is testing its ability to rapidly deploy across eastern Europe — without direct US assistance — as Washington shifts its approach toward European defense and the war in Ukraine. The six-week Steadfast Dart 2025 exercises across Bulgaria, Romania and Greece are taking place as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine approaches the three-year mark. They involve about 10,000 troops from nine nations and represent the largest NATO operation planned this year. The US absence from the exercises comes as European nations scramble to build greater military self-sufficiency over their concerns about the commitment of US President Donald Trump’s administration to common defense and