By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives Liberian human rights advocates have told a US Congressional committee that it is crucial that the US government take the lead in funding war and economic crimes courts for Liberia. The advocates, including Dr. Alan White, a former chief investigator of the UN-backed Special Court for Sierra Leone, Elizabeth Evenson,…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives MONROVIA, Liberia—Finance Minister Boima Kamara has said health issues were the cause of his absence from duty over recent months leading President Boakai to request his resignation as reported by Front Page Africa on Monday. Front Page Africa/New Narratives have learned that in a closed-door UN donor meeting on July 3…
Leading human rights lawyer Tiawan Gongloe has condemned the process for selection of the head of the Office for the War and Economics Crimes courts By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives MONROVIA, Liberia—After a bad start to the launch of the Office for the War and Economics Crimes courts human rights advocates are demanding President…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives In a hearing at the Ecowas Court of Justice in Abuja, Nigeria, the Liberian government has asked the court to dismiss a $US1.5 million lawsuit accusing it of dereliction of duty by not investigating and prosecuting those responsible for the St. Peter’s Lutheran Church massacre in Monrovia, committed by…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives Monrovia – President Joseph Boakai has taken the first step in inviting international support for the establishment of Liberia’s War and Economic Crimes Courts by sending a letter to António Guterres, the United Nations Secretary General, requesting financial and technical assistance for the courts. Requesting UN support is a crucial…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives MONROVIA, Liberia—The leader of Liberia’s powerful National Bar Association, the professional organization of the nation’s lawyers, has joined the growing list of civil society and victims’ groups that have condemned the process by which President Joseph Boakai appointed Cllr. Jonathan Massaquoi as executive director of the Office of War…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives Monrovia – The US Ambassador-at-Large for Global Criminal Justice has condemned Mr. Alan White, an American former investigator for the Sierra Leone Special Court, and a group of activists for making unsubstantiated allegations against leading human rights activists in a Congressional committee hearing in Washington D.C. last month. Mr….
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives The Finnish government has awarded €390,000 ($US426,00) in compensation to Gibril Massaquoi, the former Sierra Leonean rebel leader acquitted in January of war crimes and crimes against humanity prosecutors said he committed during Liberia’s second civil war between 1999-2003. The payment covers Mr. Massaquoi’s loss of liberty and income during the…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives MONROVIA, Liberia— Leading advocates of war time justice for Liberia have welcomed criticism by Dr. Robtel Neajai Pailey, in this year’s Independence Day oration, of the process to appoint Cllr. Jonathan Massaquoi as executive director of the War and Economic Crimes Courts Office. Dr. Pailey called on President Boakai to…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives MONROVIA, Liberia—President Joseph Boakai has withdrawn his appointment of Liberian lawyer, Jonathan Massaquoi to head the newly constituted Office of War and Economic Crimes Courts following nearly two months of public condemnation from almost all leading victims and human rights advocates and the umbrella body for lawyers in the…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives The Liberian government sought the endorsement of its war and economic crimes courts from the United Nations in a meeting on Tuesday. The meeting comes three months after President Joseph Boakai quietly sent a letter to the U.N. Secretary General, asking for technical and financial support for the courts. Though the…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives MONROVIA, Liberia—In December 2022, after 10 months of abuse and exploitation as a housemaid in Oman, Kemah was excited to hear that the Liberian government was finally coming to her rescue. Kemah was one of more than 300 women allegedly duped into traveling to Oman under false promises of…
By Anthony Stephens with New Narratives MONROVIA, Liberia—An Ivorian man is standing trial in Monrovia over human trafficking allegations in the first trial since Liberia was downgraded to the US State Department’s tier two Trafficking in Persons Watch List after the Weah administration cut off funding to trafficking prosecutions. The US government has warned the…
By Anthony Stephens, senior justice correspondent with New Narratives Summary: As Liberia intensifies debate over establishing a long-awaited war crimes court, justice experts are urging lawmakers to explicitly criminalize forced marriage in the court’s founding statute, warning that failure to do so risks sidelining one of the civil wars’ most pervasive abuses. One of these…
By Anthony Stephens, senior justice correspondent with New Narratives Summary: What was intended as a forum to build consensus instead laid bare deepening divisions over Liberia’s proposed war crimes court. At the justice conference in Monrovia last week, an ongoing public dispute between the Office of War and Economic Crimes Court of Liberia and a…
By Anthony Stephens, senior justice correspondent with New Narratives Summary: The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the primary United Nations body responsible for global human rights, is today beginning the training of Liberian lawyers focused on accountability for past crimes, as momentum rebuilds toward the establishment of a war crimes court in…
A Liberian civil war survivor says the deportation of former LURD commander Mayama Sesay, also known as “Black Diamond,” has left him fearing for his safety, Anthony Stephens reports in this social media video. To read more about this story click this link: https://tinyurl.com/3p5w4v9p This story is a collaboration with New Narratives as part of the “Investigating…
By Anthony Stephens, senior justice correspondent with New Narratives Summary: In July 2003, N. says he watched armed fighters kill his sister during Liberia’s civil war—an attack he says was ordered by former rebel commander Mayama Sesay, known as “Black Diamond.” More than two decades on, he says the memory of the gunfire, the panic,…
Liberia and Ghana now stand almost alone in West Africa as a U.S. travel ban hits neighboring countries. In this New Narratives video, experts explain the political and strategic decisions behind the exemptions and what the shifting policy means for ordinary people whose plans to travel, study, or reunite with family are suddenly at risk….
Liberians are watching a long-awaited moment in their nation’s pursuit of justice after the Office for the War and Economic Crimes Court submitted draft bills to the justice minister to establish both a war and economic crimes court and a national anti-corruption court, even as civil society groups and advocates voice deep disagreement about how…
By Anthony Stephens, senior justice correspondent with New Narratives A criminal court in Switzerland has found Alan White, an American war crimes investigator with a long history of involvement in Liberia’s politics, guilty of defaming Alain Werner, the head of Civitas Maxima, which has led efforts to bring prosecutions against more than a dozen perpetrators…
