Taylor Arrives in Nigeria's Capital Abuja

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, August 12, 2003

Taylor Arrives in Nigeria's Capital Abuja

Liberia's former president Charles Taylor arrived in Nigeria's capital Abuja Monday evening.

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Liberia's former president Charles Taylor arrived in Nigeria's capital Abuja Monday evening.

Taylor arrived in exile on board Nigeria's presidential carrier.

Ghana's President John Kuffuor, President Joachim Chissano of Mozambique and Chairman of the African Union and Executive Secretary of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Mohammed Ibn Chambas accompanied Taylor into Abuja.

Landing in Abuja in his usual white safari suit, Taylor waved at the motley reception crowd and gripped President Olusegun Obasanjo in a long handshake at the airport.

Also expected soon after Taylor's arrival is South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki.

On Sunday, Taylor made a defiant farewell speech in which he said he was being driven out by an American-led conspiracy and on Monday he stepped down and handed over the country to his vice president Moses Blah.

Annan joined other world leaders in welcoming the development in Monrovia, saying that Taylor's resignation would mark "the beginning of the end of the long nightmare of the Liberian people."

Taylor was forced to vacate office about six months to the end of his first six-year tenure.

Taylor resigned on Monday under pressure from the United States which hoped that his departure would expedite an end to violence that gripped Liberia and West Africa for nearly 14 years.

Taylor led the National Patriotic Party and his followers to fight into Liberia in 1989 and overthrew Samuel Doe. Seven years of the civil war since then claimed 200,000 lives and hundreds and thousands of people displaced.

Taylor, a former warlord, was elected president of Liberia in August 1997. He has been indicted for war crimes by a UN-backed special court in Sierra Leone.

The Liberian civil war, which lasted more than 14 years and claimed at least 200,000 lives, flared up again in 1998 following attacks launched by the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) rebels in northern Liberia.

Civil war over the past decade has made Liberia among the most miserable places in the world and the latest unrest since 1998 has forced some 300,000 Liberians to flee to neighboring countries andclaimed thousands more lives.

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