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The examination of Charles Taylor by the Sierra Leone Special Court (SLSC) begins today – on the premises of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, announces De Volkskrant. The former Liberian president stands accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed between 1996 and 2002 in neighbouring Sierra Leone by the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), infamous for “amputating limbs and recruiting children for forced labour in the diamond mines or to serve as child-soldiers or sex slaves”, recalls the Dutch daily. For Taylor, who denies the accusations and still enjoys considerable support from the Liberian population, “the trial is not a tribulation,” confirms De Volkskrant. “He looks well rested (…) and has no worries about time or money. It is the international court, in other words the international community, that is footing his lawyers’ bill, which comes to €68,000 a month.”
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