Liberia seeks Taylor's extradition from Nigeria

LAGOS, Mar 13 (Reuters) Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has written a letter to Nigeria requesting the extradition of former Liberian president Charles Taylor, an aide to Taylor said today.

Taylor has been living in Nigeria since 2003 when he was offered asylum as part of a deal to end 14 years of civil war in Liberia.

''It is a fact that she (Johnson-Sirleaf) requested the extradition of the former president,'' Sylvester Paasewe, an aide to Taylor in Nigeria's southeastern city of Calabar, told Reuters.

''I know that a letter has been transmitted here.'' The Liberian government last week denied it had written to Nigeria to ask for the handover of Taylor, who is indicted by a United Nations-backed court in Sierra Leone for war crimes.

Johnson-Sirleaf herself could not be reached for immediate comment as she was addressing the opening session of the country's Supreme Court in Monrovia.

Paasewe said that the rules of Taylor's asylum in Nigeria ruled out a trial for Taylor and he accused the United States of being behind the extradition request.

Johnson-Sirleaf is ''acting from a vindictive political position.

She wants his (Taylor's) head on plate, I am sure, to the pleasure of the Americans. I want to believe that African nations will not be railroaded into this,'' he said.

REQUEST Paasewe did not say whether the letter requested Taylor be extradited to Liberia or to the tribunal in Sierra Leone.

But Sando Johnson, a senior member of Taylor's former National Patriotic Party (NPP), told Reuters in the Liberian capital Monrovia that Johnson-Sirleaf had confirmed to party officials she had requested Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo hand Taylor over to Liberian authorities.

''We had a meeting with Mrs Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and she told us that she had asked President Obasanjo to turn Mr Taylor into the custody of the Liberian government. Obasanjo asked that the statement be reduced into writing, which she did,'' Johnson said.

Last week, her Information Minister Johnny McClain denied a previous assertion from the NPP's Johnson that Johnson-Sirleaf had requested Taylor's extradition.

''There is no truth in what Johnson is saying. There has been no letter sent to President Obasanjo asking him to turn over Mr Taylor,'' McClain told Reuters last Thursday.

''What Mrs. Sirleaf told me was that she and President Obasanjo spoke and it was agreed that consultation would be carried out with African Union leaders, ECOWAS (regional) leaders, European Union members and the international community,'' McClain said.

REUTERS SB PM1746