Ex-Leader Stole $100 Million From Liberia, Records ShowONROVIA, Liberia — Charles Taylor, for six years the warlord president of Liberia, stole or diverted nearly $100 million of his country's wealth, leaving it the poorest nation on earth, according to a close review of government records, an investigation by United Nations experts and interviews with senior Liberian officials.
Mr. Taylor stole government money to buy houses, cars and sexual partners, senior members of his government said. He illegally diverted many millions in government revenues to buy weapons in defiance of an international arms embargo, fueling a futile civil war, United Nations investigators say.
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"You can safely say it was tens of millions," Alex Vines, who served on a United Nations panel of experts trying to enforce the arms embargo against Liberia. The embargo "failed miserably, with devastating human consequences," Mr. Vines said. But the United Nations investigators, who began tracing the missing millions two years ago, starting documenting that failure by following the money.
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Mr. Taylor and his allies "didn't care how many bodies they had to crawl over to get to the cash box," said Nat Richardson, a former director of Liberia's state mining company.
Gee, I wonder what Pat Robertson has to say about his good buddy now? Seems like they're peas in a pod. Despite the fact that Liberia is rich in gold and diamonds, Taylor left Liberia the poorest nation in the world. But why should that bother Robertson, after all Taylor was his business partner and a born again fundie Christian. I'm sure Robertson's god will forgive him of any wrong doing.