The first former head of state to be convicted of war crimes since World War II will be sentenced Wednesday by an international court in The Hague, Netherlands.
Charles Taylor, president of Liberia from 1997 to 2003, was convicted last month of aiding rebels in neighboring Sierra Leone in a campaign of terror, involving murder, rape, sexual slavery and the conscription children younger than 15.
There is no death penalty in international criminal law, and Taylor, 64, would serve out any sentence the Special Court for Sierra Leone hands down in a British prison.
The former Liberian president does not see himself as a war criminal but as a victim -- a leader wronged by corruption and a hypocritical hand of justice with a political agenda.
"I never stood a chance," he said. "Only time will tell how many other African heads of state will be destroyed."
In his final courtroom stand a week ago, when he addressed the world for the last time before facing his jail term, Taylor made a plea for why he should be spared the harshest sentence for his conviction on aiding and abetting war crimes.
He said he was saddened by last month's guilty verdict, in which the court said he had assisted Revolutionary United Front rebels who fueled Sierra Leone's long and bloody civil war that ultimately left 50,000 dead or missing.
Taylor, who expressed no remorse, insisted his intent was far from what had been portrayed by prosecutors and described himself as a peacemaker.
He blamed money for an unfair trial, claiming prosecutors received millions of dollars from the United States government and witnesses were paid off.
Last month's landmark ruling by the Special Court for Sierra Leone against Taylor was the first war crimes conviction of a former head of state by an international court since the Nuremberg trials after World War II that convicted Adm. Karl Doenitz, who became president of Germany briefly after Adolf Hitler's suicide.
Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was tried by an international tribunal, but he died before a judgment was issued.
Taylor, 64, was found guilty of all 11 counts of aiding and abetting the deadly rebel campaign in Sierra Leone and mining diamonds to pay for guns.
The prosecutors failed, however, to prove that Taylor assumed direct command over the rebels who committed the atrocities.
He was a pivotal figure in Liberian politics for decades and was forced out of office under international pressure in 2003. He fled to Nigeria, where border guards arrested him three years later as he was attempting to cross into Chad.
The United Nations and the Sierra Leone government jointly set up the special tribunal to try those who played the biggest role in the atrocities. The court was moved to Netherlands from Sierra Leone, where emotions over the civil war still run high.
Few are likely to agree with Taylor's call for a mild sentence. The judges' guilty verdict last month was unanimous and prosecutors have said Taylor deserves a stiff prison sentence to reflect the gravity of the crimes.
Brenda Hollis, chief prosecutor for the Special Court for Sierra Leone, has said an 80-year sentence would be appropriate.
"But for Charles Taylor's criminal conduct, thousands of people would not have had limbs amputated, would not have been raped, would not have been killed," Hollis said in a statement released earlier. "The recommended sentence provides fair and adequate response to the outrage these crimes caused in victims, their families and relatives."
Taylor will find out his fate at 5:00 a.m. Eastern time (9:00 a.m. GMT) when the special tribunal delivers its sentence.
News credit: CNN
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