US newspaper backpedals on Taylor spy claim

DAKAR, Sunday

The publishers and editors of the Globe newspaper in Boston have retracted the story carried last week linking Charles Taylor the former Liberian president to spying for US.

The report had claimed that Taylor, the first African head of state to be prosecuted for war crimes by an international tribunal, had a years-long relationship with the US spy agency. The Globe said its report was based on information uncovered through a freedom of information request to the Central Intelligence Agency.

However, in a lengthy correction, the Globe said the front-page story “should not have run in this form.”

The newspaper said it had drawn unsupported conclusions and significantly overstepped available evidence when it described former Liberia president Charles Taylor as having worked with US spy agencies.

The story had claimed that the CIA “confirmed its agents and CIA agents worked with Taylor beginning in the early 1980s.”

However, in its correction, the daily said “the agency offered no such confirmation.”

Nevertheless, “there has long been speculation that Taylor had such a role,” the Globe added.

In a letter sent to Mr Taylor’s legal counsel, the publishers and editors of the Globe said the story was “not based on adequate reporting and drew unsupported conclusions.”

The reaction came from Mr David McCraw, the Vice President and Assistant General Counsel of the Globe which also belongs to the New York Times Company and the newspaper’s editor Mr Martin Baron, a Liberian newspaper reported.

The letter from the publishers further explained the article “significantly over stepped available evidence” when it described Mr Taylor as having worked with US spy agencies as a “sought after source”.

The reaction ostensibly stems from a threat by Mr Taylor to sue the newspaper and use American lawyers following the startling revelation on January 17, 2012.

Mr McCraw said he discovered the flaw after a careful review of the article and its sources especially the part noting that the US Defence department failed to provide further comments on the revelation citing security reasons.

In the initial report, the Globe article reporter explained that its source revealed the information in keeping the Freedom of Information Act and after six years of waiting.

But in Mr Taylor’s reaction after the publication, he acknowledged that Liberian government security agencies as well as his National Patriotic Party of Liberia had associated with the US spy agencies but not himself “personally”.

Meanwhile, it is expected that Courtenay Griffiths, who is Mr. Taylor’s lead counsel, will proceed with a settled negation of the matter while his clients awaits the UN-backed Special Court’s judgment in his trial for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The former Liberian president is awaiting the verdict in his war crimes trial at the Special Court for Sierra Leone in The Netherlands.

He is accused on 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity on claims that he armed Sierra Leone’s Revolutionary United Front (RUF) in exchange for illegally mined, so-called “blood diamonds.”

The Sierra Leone civil war claimed some 120,000 lives in the 10 years to 2001, with RUF rebels, described by the prosecution as Taylor’s “surrogate army,” mutilating thousands of civilians by hacking off their limbs.

Taylor pleaded not guilty to all charges.