Concord Times (Freetown)
Umaru S Jah
4 November 2008
The Hague — A war victim has told the trial for former Liberian President Charles Taylor in The Hague that rebels decapitated human beings during the war in Sierra Leone.
The prosecution witness Mustapha Mansaray, 60, said in 1993 rebels hacked off the heads of civilians including his uncle, Jibril Turay and connected them to a rope used to man checkpoints in Maola, Pujehun district.
"The rebels cut off my Uncle's head from the back when they met him harvesting his cassava farm in Moala," Mustapha explained and added, "this was after Foday Sankoh ordered his rebels to kill any civilian caught harvesting his or her farm in Maola."
The farms were owned by civilians in the town but according to the witness, "Foday Sankoh announced in the village that only rebels were supposed to harvest farms."
He said this act committed by rebels was mostly wrecked on civilians attempting to bypass rebel checkpoints in Maola.
Mustapha further recounted how one staff, Alhaji, hacked off his two hands and burnt a house with 53 people inside in Tombodu, Kono district in 1998.
"My two hands and those of five others were amputated in Tombodu by one staff Aljahi," he said, adding that, the amputation of his hands took place after he was captured in Worodu Sandor, Kono District by another rebel commander Staff Farma.
After his amputation, Mustapha said staff Alhaji instructed the rebels to set ablaze a house with 53 people locked inside.
"They sprinkled petrol and lit the house," he disclosed.
The witness said they were forced to leave the scene after the cries of suckling mothers and children inside the house became unbearable.
He said they fled to an area controlled by West African peacekeeping forces - ECOMOG at a place called Lebanon, Koidu town.
Mustapha blamed Charles Taylor for the bitter experience he went through during the war; an ordeal he said has had negative effects on his life even after the end of the war.
He said the accused once said in a radio broadcast that Sierra Leone would taste the bitterness of war.
"It was shortly after that statement that the war broke out in 1991. I have tasted the bitterness of that war," he said while raising his amputated hands for the Presiding Judge, Justice Teresa Dougherty to see.
In his cross-examination, defence lawyer for Charles Taylor, Moris Anyah questioned the mentioning of check points in Maola, Pujehun district and the disclosure of Jibril Turay by the witness.
He argued that Pujehun district was not part of the indictment and that the disclosure of Jibril Turay did not reflect in the interview records he had earlier received from the prosecution before the cross-examination.
The legal luminary advanced further questions regarding statements made by the witness in 2003 to the Special Court prosecution. This, he said, was not in conformity with the testimony he gave against his client, Charles Taylor.
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