U.S. bounty on Taylor

last updated 8 January 2015

Lagos, Nigeria

Nigeria is furious that the U.S. has offered $2 million to anyone who can turn over ousted Liberian president Charles Taylor to a war-crimes tribunal. Taylor, a ruthless warlord who sponsored a bloody conflict in neighboring Sierra Leone, stepped down peacefully this year after he was offered political asylum in Nigeria. There, he felt, he would be safe from charges of crimes against humanity. But in the $87 billion Iraq-war appropriations bill recently passed by Congress, a clause provides $2 million for the capture of an unnamed person indicted by the U.N. court in Sierra Leone. Nigerian government spokeswoman Remi Oyo said Nigeria would “not be harassed by anyone” into turning Taylor over.