1:50pm UK, Thursday July 16, 2009

A former Liberian president has told judges there was nothing wrong with his rebels displaying human skulls at roadblocks during the country’s 1989 revolution.

A skeleton in Monrovia, Liberia after fighting in 2003, when Taylor was deposed

Charles Taylor‘s invasion of Liberia and his ascent to power was a prelude to his involvement in the brutal 1991-2002 civil war in Sierra Leone.

He has denied 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the neighbouring country.

Taylor is not on trial for offences in Liberia, but his testimony appeared aimed at allegations that rebels he backed in Sierra Leone used terror tactics, like amputations.

Giving evidence at The Hague, he denied some of the most grisly prosecution claims.

They included his fighters in Liberia stringing human entrails across roadblocks and displaying human heads on poles to strike fear into the civilians and the Liberian army.

He dismissed as “nonsense” the allegation that his men disembowelled their enemies and tied their intestines across roads.

But the 61-year-old former president conceded skulls of Liberian soldiers were displayed at strategic roadblocks in 1980, as a warning to follow revolutionaries’ orders.

Taylor, who earned an economics degree at a US college, said he had seen images of skulls used in many “fraternal organisations” and Western universities.

“I got to realise they were enemy skulls and we didn’t think that symbol was anything wrong,” he said.

He also conceded atrocities were committed in Liberia, but said he had trained his small band of rebels – from their initial training in Libya – to abide by the laws of war.

“We found out that they were taking place and we acted to bring those responsible to justice,” he said.

Rebel soldiers who committed excesses were court-marshalled and sometimes executed, but civilian judicial institutions were left in place in areas under rebel control.

More than 90 prosecution witnesses have claimed Taylor commanded Sierra Leone rebels from the presidential mansion in Liberia.

The rebels’ signature crimes were amputations, rape and the conscription of child soldiers and enslavement of women.