PHOTO: Young Salwa Mourtada, initiator of the online petition
By Our Staff Writer
The campaign to press for the establishment of a War Crimes Court in Liberia is heating up, with an online signing of petition to the United Nations Secretary General, Antonio Guterres.
A youth, Salwa Mourtada recently started the online petitioning with five others to the UN Secretary General to “establish War Crimes Court in Liberia to bring Justice and Closure to the Liberian People,” after over 14 years of fratricidal civil war, which caused the deaths of over two hundred thousand people.
Since the Liberian civil war officially ended in August 2003, none of the warlords and their backers has ever been made to face justice for the war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated by them during the course of the armed conflict.
The country’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) submitted its report to the government of former President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, recommending prosecution for those who bear the greatest responsibility for the mayhem. But neither Sirleaf nor her successor, President George Weah have to date made any move towards this direction.
The target of the war crimes court campaigners is to secure one thousand online signatures, the number which is swelling by the minute.
When www.newspublictrust.com checked a short while ago (that is by 10:25 GMT on Saturday, May 29, 2021), the number of people signing the online petition to the UN Secretary General had reached 953.
Link to the online petition platform: https://www.change.org/p/united-nations-secretary-general-establish-war-crimes-court-in-liberia-to-bring-justice-closure-to-the-liberian-people?recruiter=1207551690&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_initial&recruited_by_id=47b13b30-c00c-11eb-82c0-51c0fcc1e223
Below is the online petition to UN Secretary General Guterres.
“Establish War Crimes Court in Liberia to bring Justice & Closure to the Liberian People”.
Approximately 200,000 lives were lost in the Liberian civil war from 1990-2003. Men, women, children and babies were murdered senselessly. Our beloved, friendly and charismatic sister, Laia Annette Mourtada, affectionately called “Lala” by her family and friends, only 16 years old at the time was brutally murdered, and her life cut short by none other than current Liberian Senator, Prince Y. Johnson in 1991. She was killed by Prince Johnson and her body was mutilated and dumped into a river in Caldwell, Liberia. She was never seen again by her family and has no grave today, along with all the other precious lives taken. We have suffered in pain and silence since then as justice for Lala was denied due to governmental corruption and lack of accountability.
Today, Prince Y. Johnson serves as a senator in the Liberian government and has never expressed any remorse for his actions and continues to benefit from the labor of the same Liberian people he totured not so long ago.
We implore you to lend our collective voices and pens to sign this petition to bring justice to our sister Lala, and all of our brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers and grandparents, aunts and uncles who lost their lives from the senseless actions of all the “War Lords” in Liberia. We need to establish a “war and economic crimes court” in Liberia and need over 100,000 signatures to sign this petition to get the Secretary General of the United Nations to lend their support in establishing this court to finally hold the “War Lords” accountable for their actions and bring the perpetrators to justice! Most importantly, to bring closure to the Liberian people! This is the moment, this is our movement, this is the year! # Justice for Lala. #Justice for Liberia! Thank you for taking a moment to sign this petition!”