Charles Taylor to be Imprisoned in the U.K.

Ex-president of Liberia’s wish to serve his 50-year war crimes sentence in Rwanda denied

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Peter Dejong / Pool / Reuters

Former Liberian President Charles Taylor (L) looks on at the Special Court for Sierra Leone in Leidschendam, western Netherlands, January 22, 2013.

Former Liberian president Charles Taylor will serve his 50-year war crimes sentence in a U.K. prison, the British Justice Minister Jeremy Wright said on Thursday. Sweden and Rwanda had also offered to incarcerate Taylor, whose appeal to a U.N.-backed court in The Hague was rejected on Sept. 26.

Taylor was sentenced for encouraging rebels in Sierra Leone’s 1991-2002 civil war to mutilate, rape and murder its victims. He is the first head of state to be convicted of war crimes since the Nuremburg trials after World War II. In a previous statement to the International Criminal Court, Taylor had asked to serve his sentence in Rwanda.

(MORE: Warlord convicted: Liberia’s Charles Taylor Found Guilty of War Crimes)