International mediators push for peace force in Liberia

MONROVIA, Liberia -- U.N. Security Council ambassadors worked Sunday to assemble an international peace force for war-devastated Liberia, which is preparing for talks with Nigeria, a regional power expected to play a lead role in any deployment.

Security Council diplomats were looking toward the United States, a holdout in the growing drive for peacekeepers. European and African diplomats say Washington should take a larger role in efforts to end the escalating 3-year war in American-founded Liberia.

"It's their baby, and they have a responsibility there," Cameroon U.N. Ambassador Martin Chungong Ayafor said of the United States, echoing earlier comments of British and French diplomats and others.

President Bush declared on Thursday that Taylor, an indicted U.N. war crimes suspect, must step down.

Americans largely have little awareness of what Liberians see as a lasting, special bond. Washington has shown no willingness to lead an international peace force between some of West Africa's most vicious and undisciplined fighters.

Talks in Nigeria

Security Council members, on the second stop of a West African mission focusing on Liberia, traveled Sunday to the Nigerian capital of Abuja for talks with President Olusegun Obasanjo and Mohamed Ibn Chambas, executive-secretary of West Africa's bloc of regional leaders.

Chambas' group has promised a 5,000-troop force to separate Liberia's warring sides. Nigeria's military -- West Africa's largest, best-armed and best-trained -- could lead such a force.

Meetings came after U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged deployment of an international force, warning Saturday of a "humanitarian tragedy" as Liberia's rebels and government battle for control of a capital with more than 1 million trapped residents and refugees.

Chambas, going into closed meetings with U.N. ambassadors, called for coordination between the Security Council and Liberia's neighbors.

British U.N. Ambassador Jeremy Greenstock declared the Security Council "very keen to work out with you and the leaders of the region how we can find the instruments" to end the conflict.

Obasanjo's military has taken the lead in West African peace forces for years.

Nigeria has led past deployments in Liberia during the 1989-1996 civil war, when Charles Taylor -- then a warlord -- pitted his troops against the West African intervention force.

Liberia's crisis has rebels attacking the capital, Monrovia, in their fight to oust Taylor, who won presidential elections in 1997 and is accused of continuing to fuel West Africa's arms trade, illicit diamond traffic and conflicts.

With pressure building abroad and among Liberia's desperate people for an international force, Taylor has declared his willingness for such a deployment -- and urged the United States to become more involved.

Taylor toured battle-devastated western neighborhoods Sunday in a bulletproof Mercedes under guard of machine guns and rocket-launchers.

He thanked his rag-tag, largely unpaid fighters for their "gallantry," but ordered them to stop the nighttime robberies and shooting that continue to panic the city.

Liberia was founded by former American slaves in the 19th century. It had strong ties with the United States through the Cold War, when it served as a leading U.S. base for intelligence activity against Moammar Gadhafi's Libya.

"America should take the lead," said Sando Moore, managing editor of Monrovia's New National daily.

"If they don't like Taylor, that doesn't mean that they should turn their back to Liberia," Moore said. "Taylor is not Liberia."

Britain, France, U.N. officials and others point to the effectiveness of recent British and French deployments in quelling conflicts in their former West African colonies.

"As France is to Ivory Coast and Britain is to Sierra Leone, the United States is to Liberia," Ayafor, the Cameroon ambassador, said Sunday.

Taylor himself pledged during peace talks this month to cede power but then reneged, saying he would stay in power at least through the January end of his term.

West Africa promised a peace force of at least 5,000 for Liberia if warring sides halt fighting, and France suggested Saturday it was open to contributing troops.

Annan urged the creation of a multinational force after a four-day battle between government and rebel forces for Monrovia, which ended when rebels pulled out of the city Friday. The fighting killed an estimated 500 civilians -- many buried in hasty graves on the city's Atlantic Ocean beaches.

Along with Taylor's resignation, a peacekeeping force was called for in a Liberian cease-fire deal that fell apart soon after it was reached June 17 in Ghana.

The escalation in fighting for the capital came at the same time a U.N. court announced Taylor's war-crimes indictment for backing the brutal rebels of neighboring Sierra Leone. Taylor says Liberia will know no peace as long as the indictment stands.