The New Dawn Monrovia – The Coalition for Justice in Liberia (CJL) is demanding justice for the murder of five Catholic nuns in Gardnersville and estimated 250,000 innocent Liberians during the Liberian civil war.
“CJL feels compelled to call attention to the quest for justice for the victims of the Liberian civil war. We cannot ignore the fact that those estimated 250,000 innocent Liberians and foreign nationals who lost their lives at the brutal hands of war perpetrators, are yet to experience the bells of justice”, the group noted.
According to CJL Interim Director, Lovetta G. Tugbeh, the operation was spearheaded by one General Christopher “Mosquito” Vambo, who allegedly acting on orders from Mr. Charles Taylor, held the nuns captive, had them disrobed and bludgeoned to death.
She pointed out that Sisters Kathleen McGuire, Barbara Muttra, Agnes Mueller, Mary Kolar, and Shirley Kolmer, were brutally murdered by Taylor and his militias, while noting that the country now rightfully brags about 10 years of peace, with the support of the international community, which all Liberians must celebrate and fight to keep.
However, she stressed that Liberians must remind fellow compatriots that the country’s peace is still fragile, and that peace can only be sustained here when it is rooted in justice.
“They called themselves freedom fighters, but they killed innocent people; we pray for those liars”, said the late Roman Catholic Archbishop, Michael Kpakala Francis, when he expressed remorse and antipathy surrounding the horrific killing of the five nuns at the evil hands of war criminals, who maimed, raped, and murdered more than 250, 000 innocent Liberians and foreign nationals.
“Under the notorious code name of “Operation Octopus”, rebel forces of the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) of convicted war criminal Charles Taylor, carried out a gruesome campaign of indiscriminately killing innocent Liberians and foreign nationals in the Barnerville community located on the outskirts of Monrovia, the country’s civic and commercial capital,” Madam Tugbeh noted.
She narrated that documented reports and revelations made at the TRC public hearings few years ago, uncovered that the ‘Operation Octopus’ was conceived with the purpose of implementing a pogrom to ensure that the NPFL exerted full and total control over the City of Monrovia and its environs and its would become the NPFL’s scorched-earth policy and template for prosecuting its senseless war throughout the 90’s, making the city unsafe and unlivable for its inhabitants, meting out unspeakable crimes to instill fear and submission in the populace.
She said though Taylor was charged for war crimes in neighboring Sierra Leone and sentenced to a 50-yr prison term by the International Criminal Court (ICC), neither he nor other war crimes perpetrators were charged for war crimes in Liberia.
“Nearly 21 years after this horrendous criminal act that was carried out on October 20, 1992, the Coalition for Justice in Liberia (CJL) wishes to remember these five nuns for their sacrificial humanitarian services they rendered the people of Liberia, many of whom are living impoverished and traumatized war victims,” Madam Tugbeh added.
According to her, the enviable missionary work of the nuns, who left the comfort of their homeland in the United States to come to Liberia to help educate its youth and treat its sick, should not go unnoticed as thousands of Liberian youths who otherwise would not have had that opportunity, benefitted greatly from their tremendous sacrifice and generosity.
“One youth, recalling his experience, remembered the nuns as “loving, kind, and caring” in all that they did during their many years in Liberia. Moreover, CJL recognizes and applauds the significant contributions the nuns and the Catholic Church have made in some of the remotest areas of the country that is yet to experience the presence and impact of the national government policies”, she noted.
Madam Tugbeh concluded by emphasizing that “As Liberians, we can only enjoy real peace when war perpetrators who committed crimes of war and crimes against humanity, face the full weight of justice”, stressing that the CJL will not relent in its advocacy for truth and justice, and will continue to immortalize those who died in the senseless war that left deep scars on the nation.
