Charles Taylor

Jan. 28, 1948: Charles Taylor born in Arthington, Liberia, into a family descended from freed American slaves. 1970s: Lives in Boston area of the United States, earning an economics degree from Bentley College in Waltham, Massachusetts. 1983: Flees Liberia after being accused of embezzling nearly US$1 million. He is later detained in the United States on a Liberian arrest warrant. 1985: Escapes from a Massachusetts jail. December 1989: Taylor's National Patriotic Front of Liberia rebel group launches armed uprising in Liberia, sparking a conflict that leaves 200,000 dead.

LEIDSCHENDAM, Netherlands — Convicted war criminal and former Liberian president Charles Taylor said during his sentencing hearing Wednesday that he sympathizes with victims of the civil war in Sierra Leone he helped foment, and he asked judges to render their sentence against him in a spirit of "reconciliation, not retribution. " However, he stopped short of admitting any wrongdoing, apologizing for his actions, or expressing remorse. In a landmark ruling in April, judges at the Special Court for Sierra Leone found Taylor guilty of 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against...

Editor's note: This article first appeared in The Boston Globe on June 3, 2007. WASHINGTON - In the fall of 1998, as President Charles Taylor consolidated his grip on Liberia, the defense attache at the US Embassy invited representatives of the country's formerly warring factions to a series of dinners at his residence. The overture was intended to help the West African nation make a fresh start after more than a decade of civil war. But Taylor's government had other ideas: Members of the three opposing factions "who attended these dinners have been shot dead," the embassy bluntly...

AMSTERDAM - Charles Taylor, the former president of Liberia, deserves an 80-year sentence for the war crimes he was convicted of last week, including aiding and abetting murder and rape on a mass scale, prosecutors said in a written filing Thursday. Judges at the Special Court for Sierra Leone on April 26 ruled Taylor played a crucial role in helping rebels to continue a bloody rampage during that West African nation's 11-year civil war, which ended in 2002 with more than 50,000 dead.

LEIDSCHENDAM, Netherlands — Convicted war criminal and former Liberian president Charles Taylor said during his sentencing hearing Wednesday that he sympathizes with victims of the civil war in Sierra Leone he helped foment, and he asked judges to render their sentence against him in a spirit of "reconciliation, not retribution. " However, he stopped short of admitting any wrongdoing, apologizing for his actions, or expressing remorse. In a landmark ruling in April, judges at the Special Court for Sierra Leone found Taylor guilty of 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against...

WASHINGTON - When Charles G. Taylor tied bed sheets together to escape from a second-floor window at the Plymouth House of Correction on Sept. 15, 1985, he was more than a fugitive trying to avoid extradition. He was a sought-after source for American intelligence. After a quarter-century of silence, the US government has confirmed what has long been rumored: Taylor, who would become president of Liberia and the first African leader tried for war crimes, worked with US spy agencies during his rise as one of the world's most notorious dictators.

LEIDSCHENDAM, Netherlands — Charles Taylor’s lawyer branded the war crimes case against the former Liberian president “neocolonialism’’ built on circumstantial evidence, calling on the judges at the trial yesterday to acquit his client on all counts. In his closing statement, Courtenay Griffiths sought to take apart the prosecution case, charging that the trial of the once-powerful Liberian leader is “politically motivated’’ to ensure he does not return to power in Liberia.

FREETOWN, Sierra Leone -- The Al Qaeda suspects in the deadly 1998 bombings of two US embassies took shelter in West Africa in the months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, converting terror cash into untraceable diamonds, according to the findings of a UN-backed court obtained by the Associated Press. The allegations were made as part of the Sierra Leone war crimes court's investigation of former Liberian president Charles Taylor, alleged to have been a middleman between Al Qaeda and West Africa's multimillion-dollar diamond trade.

LEIDSCHENDAM, Netherlands — The war crimes trial of Charles Taylor, former president of Liberia, once among West Africa’s most powerful figures, ended yesterday with judges expected to take months to reach a verdict on whether he can be linked to murders and amputations during Sierra Leone’s civil war. In their final remarks, prosecutors cautioned the judges against being taken in by Taylor, “an intelligent and charismatic man’’ who...

AMSTERDAM - Charles Taylor, the former president of Liberia, deserves an 80-year sentence for the war crimes he was convicted of last week, including aiding and abetting murder and rape on a mass scale, prosecutors said in a written filing Thursday. Judges at the Special Court for Sierra Leone on April 26 ruled Taylor played a crucial role in helping rebels to continue a bloody rampage during that West African nation's 11-year civil war, which ended in 2002 with more than 50,000 dead.

Editor's note: This article first appeared in The Boston Globe on June 3, 2007. WASHINGTON - In the fall of 1998, as President Charles Taylor consolidated his grip on Liberia, the defense attache at the US Embassy invited representatives of the country's formerly warring factions to a series of dinners at his residence. The overture was intended to help the West African nation make a fresh start after more than a decade of civil war. But Taylor's government had other ideas: Members of the three opposing factions "who attended these dinners have been shot dead," the embassy bluntly...

April 26 (Bloomberg) -- Former Liberian President Charles Taylor was found guilty by an international tribunal for supporting fighters to commit atrocities during an 11-year civil war in neighboring Sierra Leone. Sentencing will take place on May 30, Justice Richard Lussick said after a more than two hour-long reading of the court's verdict in The Hague. Taylor, 64, is the first former head of state to be convicted by an international court for war crimes since World War Two. He was charged with 11 counts, including terrorizing civilians, murder, rape and...

Editor's note: This article first appeared in The Boston Globe on July 16, 2009. WASHINGTON -- Breaking two and a half decades of silence, former Liberian president and accused war criminal Charles G. Taylor said today that his infamous prison break from the Plymouth County Correctional Facility in 1985 was aided by the US government, addressing for the first time widely circulated conspiracy theories about his return to Liberia. In the second day of his testimony in his war crimes trial that could settle the long-standing...

THE HAGUE - Charles G. Taylor, the former president of Liberia and once a powerful warlord, was convicted by an international tribunal Thursday of arming, supporting, and guiding a brutal rebel movement that committed mass atrocities in Sierra Leone during its civil war in the 1990s. He is the first head of state to be convicted by an international court since the Nuremberg trials after World War II. After 13 months of deliberation, a panel of three judges from Ireland, Samoa, and Uganda found Taylor guilty of crimes against humanity and war crimes,...

Editor's note: This article first appeared in The Boston Globe on July 9, 2009. WASHINGTON -- It has been a mystery for more than two decades how former Liberian president Charles G. Taylor broke out of the Plymouth County Correctional Facility in 1985, beginning a journey that ultimately made him one of Africa's most notorious strongmen. The world may finally get its answer as early as next week when Taylor takes the stand for the first time in his war crimes trial in The Hague, where he is accused of ordering atrocities during neighboring Sierra...

Judges at an international war crimes tribunal will deliver landmark judgments Thursday in the trial of former Liberian President Charles Taylor, who is charged with sponsoring brutal rebel groups in neighboring Sierra Leone's civil war. Prosecutors alleged at Taylor's trial that the charismatic war lord-turned elected president funneled arms, ammunition and even mining equipment to rebels in return for blood diamonds and power in the volatile West...

PARIS -- Interpol issued a call yesterday for the arrest of ousted Liberian leader Charles Taylor, putting him on its wanted list. But Nigeria, where Taylor, who has been indicted on war crimes charges, lives in exile, indicated that it would not be pressured into handing him over. The wanted notice, posted on Interpol's website and distributed to the international police organization's 181 member nations, said the 55-year-old former warlord is sought for "crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the 1949 Geneva Conventions.

OTA, Nigeria -- This West African nation's influential president set tough terms yesterday for two African pariahs, pledging to "persuade" indicted war criminal Charles Taylor to surrender for trial if Liberia asks and to bar Zimbabwe's president from an international summit. Olusegun Obasanjo's comments came in a rare interview. He has strongly resisted US congressional pressure to turn Taylor, the outsted Liberian president, over for prosecution on a UN-backed indictment for war crimes.

Jan. 28, 1948: Charles Taylor born in Arthington, Liberia, into a family descended from freed American slaves. 1970s: Lives in Boston area of the United States, earning an economics degree from Bentley College in Waltham, Massachusetts. 1983: Flees Liberia after being accused of embezzling nearly US$1 million. He is later detained in the United States on a Liberian arrest warrant. 1985: Escapes from a Massachusetts jail. December 1989: Taylor's National Patriotic Front of Liberia rebel group launches armed uprising in Liberia, sparking a conflict that leaves 200,000 dead.

1972: Charles G. Taylor, 24, arrives in Boston on student visa; attends Bentley College, works in South Boston, and lives for the next decade mainly in Roxbury. 1980: Joins new Liberian government after Samuel Doe mounts successful coup with Taylor's help. 1983: Flees to Boston after being charged with embezzling government funds. May 24, 1984: Arrested in Somerville and jailed in Plymouth. Sept. 15, 1985: Escapes from Plymouth House of Correction. December 1989: As head of rebel army, launches incursion into Liberia from Ivory Coast,...