7 March 2008
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The monitors of former President Charles Taylor's trial report for www.charlestaylortrial.org
RUF Insider's Cross-Examination Continues
The session restarted ten minutes after the closed session requested by Prosecution lawyer, Shyamala Alagendra.
Terry Munyard restarted cross examination of Mansaray. A rough outline of the exhcange follows
Def: Told us at the end of yesterday that witness kept duplicate copies of reports sent to superiors. Do you remember saying that?
Wit: Yes.
Def: Also said there were IDU offices across the country. How many places were the IDU based in?
Wit: I can't explain the various parts in the RUF operation. I cannot give you an exact numberof IDU commanders or personnel. I can only explain the structure.
Def: can you give us a rough idea of IDU commanders?
Wit: Overall commander GBao, four brigades in the RUF, there were IDU commanders who were brigade commanders, each brigade had four battalions, each battalion had four companies. From the brigade level, had IDU commanders in each level.
Def: Was there a central office to which all IDU reports were meant to be sent?
Wit: It didnt' happen that way.
Def: So individual IDU commanders sent the reports off to their immediate superiors and if they wanted to keep a copy, they would keep it themselves wherever they were located?
Wit: The IDU - if the report was prepared by the company commander, it was sent to battalion commander, who would send it to the overall commander.
Def: Did the overall commander keep the reports in one particular place?
Wit: I can't say. He was the overall commander. I couldn't say whether he kept them or gave them to any other person.
Def: Where did you keep your duplicate reports?
WitL I kept them with me.
Def: How many years did you keep these reports, in the belief that Foday Sankoh may one day read them?
Wit: From Nov 1996 I kept duplicate records up to July 2000.
Def: So for nearly four years you kept copies of all the reports you sent off? Where did you keep them?
Wit: I kept them in the house where I was residing.
Def: You moved over the years — did you take the reports to each new place?
Wit: Yes they were with me.
Def: Where did the duplicate reports end up?
Wit: When Sesay, Kallon and former commanders took law into their own hands and killed the peacekeepers, after the ensuing struggle everything was burnt.
Def: What ensuing struggle?
Wit: When the UN peacekeepers came to rescue their colleagues at Kailahun and Pendembu. Issa's order to fight them - they were shooting at us, helicopters over us, so the house was put on fire and everything was burnt.
Def: So you are blaming the UN for the destruction of these records?
Wit: I am not blaming the UN, but my own commanders - Kallon, Sesay and Gbao — they took the law into their own hands, took vehicles. The blame would be on my commanders. They gave the cause for those documents to be destroyed.
Def: Did you really keep copies?
Wit: I've been saying this before I came to court. I was interested in the work so I kept court documents.
Def: You said IDU members could fight if they wished to - correct? Did IDU members always get issued with a weapon?
Wit: We had weapons. We had to secure our lives and our docs.
Def: So you carried a weapon in the IDU.
Wit: Yes.
Def: Before you joined the IDU, what were you doing within the RUF?
Wit: I used to go to the frontline to fight.
Def: Did you go to the frontline between 1994 and January 2001?
Wit: It did happen when instructions or commands were given to me, to go with the mission to observe the situation to secure my life and documents.
Def: You looted people's property. Can you give us some examples of where you looted people's property?
Wit: from April 1991 to the time of the disarmament in 2001 we lived on looted property.
Def: So you looted property in Kuiva?
Wit: Right.
Def: You were then working as part of the IDU? Did anyone make a report about your looting property in Kuiva?
Wit: I don't know if someone wrote something about that. I used to write a report that we were looting property.
Def: You looted people's property and then wrote a report complaining about your own behaviour? You knew nothing would happen to you if you wrote a report, didn't you?
Wit: About the looting? Nothing happened.
Def: You knew nothing would happen, didn't you?
Wit: Yes.
Def: Writing reports about yourself or anyone else was a completely paper exercise, wasn't it?
Wit: Well, we are not writing those things on the paper for nothing. There were crimes we included which needed action to be taken.
Def: But you know no action would be taken certainly from 1996 didn't you?
Wit: For looting no action was taken.
Def: Didn't you know that no action would be taken on your reports from November 1996 onwards?
Wit: That was the way it happened.
Def: Are you agreeing with me that you knew that nothing would happen as a result of writing reports from November 1996 onwards?
Wit: Yes because they did not act on them from November 1996.
DEf: When you left the IDU and went to work in the mines, did you either mistreat prisoners yourself or order your men to mistreat prisoners?
Wit: What prisoners did you mean?
Def: I meant civilians, not prisoners.
Wit: well, yes. Well I specifically did not do that, but the order that the overall mining commander would give I would pass on to my personnel.
Def: You would order your men to bring civilians at gunpoint to the government mines to mine for the RUF?
Wit: That was how it happened. I got those instructions.
Def: And sometimes you saw your men beating the civilians if they refused your order to come and mine for the RUF, correct?
Wit: Yes I saw my personnel under my command beating civilians.
Def: You knew that was in breach of the RUF regulations?
Wit: Yes that is true.
Def: Did you stop them?
Wit: That was an order given by the overall commander. But I used to make some efforts.
Def: Sometimes you did not stop your men beating civilians brought to the mine.
Wit: Yes it used to happen when I was not present. They would beat civilians. Btu I would go and assist the civilians and I would tell them to stop beating the civilians.
Def: But sometimes you didn't tell the personnel to stop beating the civilians?
Wit: No when I was present, I would not allow competition between personnel and civilians.
Def You have been interviewed by the OTP on more than a dozen occasions. They had interviewed you on the mining.
You know that the prosecution has to give to the defense copies of notes of interviews with you?
Wit: I don't know about that.
Def: Can you remember being interviewed in October last year?
Wit: Yes.
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